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GERMANY'S Isolation 



Germany's Isolation 

An Composition of the Economic 
Causes of the War 



By 

Paul Rohrbach 

Professor of Colonial Economy in the Commercial 
Academy of Berlin 



Translated from the German 

By 

Paul H. Phillipson, Ph.D. 

Department of Germanic Languages and Literatures 
of the University of Chicago 




CHICAGO 

A. C. McCLURG & CO, 

1915 






Copyright 

A. C. McClurg & Co. 

1915 



Published April, 1915 



W, f. HAVL PRINTING COMPANY, CHICAGO 



RPR 12 1915 



iCl,A397518 



f TRANSLATOR'S NOTE 

^ Tj^OR some time after August 4, 1914, the 
■■" writing of war literature was the fashion of 
the day. Perfectly respectable men and women, 
who in the ordinary walks of life would not 
harm the proverbial fly, suddenly plunged their 
unsuspecting pens shamelessly into the hearts of 
innocent inkwells and covered miles of snowy 
paper with sable wreck and ruin. Thundering 
polemics defending the cause of one or more 
belligerents and imploring perdition upon the 
opponent were hurled against suffering human- 
ity. Peaceful citizens in public or private gather- 
ings seemed to have forgotten their time-honored 
greetings of the day, and, instead, heaped such 
insults as "Militarism," *' Neutrality," "Kultur," 
and "Allies" upon each other. A huge con- 
spiracy between authors, publishers, linotypes, 
and binderies was unearthed. America fairly 
reeled with all this horror. 

Now that peace has been restored — at least 
on this side of the Atlantic — an examination 
into the status quo reveals the curious fact that 
almost all ammunition employed, from the small- 
est to the largest caliber, had been canned in 
American factories. I am excepting, of course, 

V 



vi Translator's Note 

such floating mines as Bernhardi, Treitschke, and 
Nietzsche, which had torn loose from their an- 
chorings years and even decades ago, and are 
now fished up, overhauled, and again put to 
belligerous use, strangely enough by the enemy. 
But the countries at war have contributed least 
of all to the vast stores of literary ordnance. 

In presenting Paul Rohrbach's book to the 
English-speaking public, it has not been my de- 
sire to disturb the tranquillity of re-assured peace. 
On the contrary, I have been actuated by the 
purer motive of permitting a voice from across 
the sea, a voice of reason, to outring the hues 
and cries of passionate partisanship. I do not 
wish to be misunderstood. Rohrbach's book is 
distinctly partisan in the sense that no expression 
of thought, engendered, as it were, in the very 
midst of the most tragic event that history has 
yet recorded, can or should be free from partisan- 
ship. But it is the partisanship of reason, to 
which, of the innumerable host of spiritual 
defendants, America has ever granted the fairest 
trial. 

A word or two regarding Dr. Rohrbach. He 
was born in 1869 in Livland and obtained his 
training in the higher schools of Mitau and at 
the universities of Dorpat, Berlin, and Strass- 
burg. His academic education completed, he 
undertook extensive travels in Asia and Africa. 
From 1903 to 1906 he occupied the position of 



Translator's Note vM 

imperial commissioner in Southwest Africa, 
Since then he has been professor of colonial 
economy in the Commercial Academy of Berlia. 
Numerous publications, of which the present little 
volume is one of the most recent, attest his 
enormous store of first-hand information and 
practical knowledge of his subject, and in all of 
them is a note of truth and conviction which 
cannot fail alike to impress friend and foe. He 
is a fearless critic of the people no less than of 
the government, and the most brilliant exponent 
of a greater colonial Germany. Rohrbach's mind 
translated into American ways of thinking and 
doing would render the author one of our fore- 
most fellow citizens and patriots. 

The German title of the present volume is 
Der Krieg und die deutsche Politik, which 
translated into English reads, The War and the 
German Foreign Policy. Whatever may have 
been the object of the author (or publisher?) in 
choosing that title, certain it is that it does not 
adequately express the contents of the book. I 
have, therefore, availed myself of a privilege 
which is sanctioned by precedent when I sub- 
stitute for the title of Rohrbach's choice the 
more pertinent one of Germany's Isolation; an 
Exposition of the Economic Causes of the War. 

Paul H. Phillipson. 

The University of Chicago, 
March, igi^. 



AUTHOR'S PREFACE 

^IpHE present work was started several months 
-■- previous to the Serajevo murder, and com- 
pleted when the first battles on the soil of Lor- 
raine and Belgium had been fought. In the first 
five chapters, therefore, the danger of war is 
presumed as existing in the future — though not 
in the remote future; in the sixth chapter the 
outbreak of the conflict, as the result of the 
Servian crime, is considered imminent; the 
seventh chapter treats of the war. For a time 
I was undecided whether or not it would be 
advisable, after the outbreak of the struggle, to 
continue and conclude the work. After mature 
deliberation and counsel with my publisher, I 
finally decided in the affirmative and resolved, 
at the same time, to print the chapters which 
had been written before the war in their original 
form. In that way I hope to be able all the more 
readily to point out that the crisis which had 
come to a sudden and violent issue was entirely 
in the line of the necessary development of 
affairs. 

The war has been forced upon us, and yet we 
must look upon it as a stroke of good fortune 
that the sacrificial death of Archduke Francis 

ix 



X Author's Preface 

Ferdinand led to the premature outbreak of the 
great anti-German conspiracy. Two years later 
the war would have been far more difficult, its 
victims more numerous, and its outcome less 
certain. Today, however, it is safe to assert, in 
view of the results achieved at the beginning and 
in the more advanced stages of the war, that the 
victory over all our enemies, join them who may, 
is less a question of military than of moral sig- 
nificance. The trust in our success is fitly illus- 
trated by an episode in biblical history. We read 
in the book of Isaiah about the plot of the king 
of Damascus and Samaria against the house of 
David in Jerusalem. King Ahaz, so the story 
runs, was told of the alliance of his two powerful 
opponents, and his heart and the heart of his 
people were moved as the trees of the wood are 
moved with the wind. Then the prophet went 
forth to meet him and said unto him, " Fear not, 
neither be fainthearted for the two tails of these 
smoking firebrands ; ask thee a sign of the Lord !" 
But Ahaz feared and said, "I will not ask, 
neither will I tempt the Lord." And Isaiah said, 
"Is it a small thing for you to weary men, but 
will ye weary my God also ? Therefore the Lord 
Himself shall give you a sign; Behold, a virgin 
shall conceive and bear a son and shall call his 
name Immanuel (that is, God is with us)." 
Danger will indeed pass so fast that the young 
mother who conceives the child in time of grief. 



Author's Preface xi 

will call it by the name of triumph, " The Lord is 
with us/' 

This story teaches a wonderful lesson. We 
may face the most severe test of strength that 
fate has ever imposed upon us, with the same 
confidence which gleams forth from the words 
of the prophet. The thousands of young women 
who at the beginning of the war had been united 
in wedlock with the husbands of their choice, 
may choose as confidently as the mother of 
Immanuel a name of triumph for their offspring 
which will be born in the fateful hour of this 
titanic struggle. They may do so in the firm 
conviction that we cannot be conquered if our 
moral strength holds out. If, on the other hand, 
we succumb to the power of our united oppo- 
nents, our fall will not have been caused by the 
weakness and inability of our armed forces, but 
by the lack of moral endurance in the face of the 
great trial. 

We do not enter into this war as we did into 
the war of 1870, with the recent experiences of 
two victorious campaigns. At the opening of 
the struggle we had no leaders whom the nation 
at home and in the field could regard in advance 
with the same confidence which the preceding 
generation, when called to arms against France, 
reposed in their generals. Even in point of 
diplomatic preparation this war differs from the 
one which resulted in the unification of the 



xii Author's Preface 

German Empire. These facts make it all the 
more obvious that we did not want the war, but 
that it was handed us as a present so that we 
might experience the inner unification, the great 
rise of our national spirit, and be at last in the 
position to fight for our rightful place among 
the great powers of the world. Nothing would 
have been more dangerous and more calamitous 
for our country than that the outbreak of the 
war be delayed another two years, the enemies 
meanwhile redoubling their strength to strike at 
us all the harder. For a brief moment or two, 
when new enemies arose and our allies denied 
us their assistance, it seemed as if a shadow of 
apprehension were cast over our country. But 
when our army demonstrated that it could suc- 
cessfully resist every enemy, the cloud of anxiety 
passed as fast as it had appeared. As to the 
triumphs gained in battles, in the west no less 
than in the east, we may, in the spirit of un- 
wavering confidence, even now call our sons 
of 1915, "Children of Victory." 

But the greatest task we are facing is the duty 
of self-sacrifice incumbent upon our more fortu- 
nate fellow citizens. Unlike our opponents, we 
have the substantial internal advantage of strik- 
ing from necessity, without choice and without 
the possibility of parrying the thrust which is 
aimed at our life. Our opponents, however, are 
striking from political principles, considerations, 



Author's Preface xiii 

and impulses of various kinds. For this reason 
every one of them is more or less firmly bound 
to the war and to the war-pact. The war broke 
out in midsummer, and not, as desired by the 
enemy, at a time when our provisions would have 
shortly been consumed. Fortunately, our crops 
had this year been as plentiful as seldom before, 
and the national larder was well stocked with 
meat and other provisions. With regard to our 
general armament, such as artillery equipment, 
arms, and uniforms, we had lately gained con- 
siderable advantages over the Russians and 
French. Equally fortunate was the fact that 
just in summer our naval troops had completed 
their training. And yet fate decreed that our 
opponents be unexpectedly forced to act. Unlike 
the Russians, we are able, without foreign assist- 
ance, to manufacture, within our own borders, 
all necessary material for direct or indirect mili- 
tary use. One and only one serious difficulty 
arises in the face of assured victory. Can the 
national food supply, which is available within 
the boundaries of the empire, be made accessible 
to all those who are in special need of it for their 
maintenance and health? 

England joined our two enemies, France and 
Russia, with the supposition that by cutting off 
our supplies and starving us economically the 
war would all the faster be decided to our dis- 
advantage, after which England's commerce 



xiv Author's Preface 

would have undisputed sway throughout the 
world. With regard to food supplies proper, 
such action would just this year fall short of 
its purpose. Not so, if our industry be deprived 
of the necessary raw material. We have some 
reserve stock, perhaps more than the enemy 
thinks; yet within a conceivable space of time 
there is bound to be a shortage. We do not 
produce any cotton and silk, and only a fraction 
of our requisite supply of wool and other animal 
products, of most metals, of timber, oils, etc. 
As a result, our factories will soon have to shut 
down, not only on account of the withdrawal of 
employees able to bear arms, but also for lack 
of raw material. More than half of our imports 
consists of industrial raw material and almost 
two-thirds of our exports of finished products. 
The English, who are fully aware of these facts, 
will scarcely hesitate, if hard pressed, to declare 
all raw material which may be imported into 
Germany by way of neutral countries contraband 
of war. If there is no other way, they will be 
ready to reimburse the Americans, whom they 
cannot disregard, for the cotton withheld from 
shipment to Germany. 

How will the account look on the other side? 
The largest and most important item which we 
should find there is the firm resolution by public 
and private contributions to support the hungry 
and needy, those that did not go into the field. 



'Author's Preface xv 

men unable to bear arms, women, and children, 
until the attack of the enemy is broken down and 
we are in the position to conclude a peace which 
will heal the wounds of war and make it possible 
for us to maintain our rank as a world power. 
Germany and Austria together have a population 
which, in round figures, amounts to one hundred 
and twenty millions. These two countries are 
now engaged in a life and death struggle. They 
have a sufficient supply of food and implements 
of war. Even if the leadership and success of 
our armies were of average quality, it is obvious, 
beyond doubt, that, as far as the human mind is 
able to foretell, we cannot be crushed with such 
overwhelming odds that the terms of peace will 
be dictated by our enemies. If nothing else, the 
internal affairs of France and Russia renders 
this assurance doubly sure. Neither one of these 
two nations is characterized by a degree of 
strength and a public spirit of solidarity great 
enough to produce in their citizens the willing- 
ness to sacrifice their last possessions in behalf 
of the cause. Even if Italy should decide to join 
the ranks of our opponents, we have no longer 
any cause for alarm. 

If no disturbances in nature interfere with the 
logical course of events, there is nothing that 
could force Germany into a premature peace but 
the starvation of the breadless, an emergency 
which will be brought about only by the refusal 



xvi Author's Preface 

of the rich to share their plenty with the needy. 
It is not impossible that a state income tax of an 
extremely high rate will be imposed or raised by 
voluntary contributions, not for the purpose of 
defraying the expenses of the war, but to buy 
bread and meat, German-grown products, for 
those that are unable to provide for themselves 
because they have been deprived of the opportu- 
nity to earn a living by the labor of their hands. 
It is impossible to starve out Germany, as she 
depends neither for her food supply nor for her 
implements of war upon foreign markets. What 
more is there to be said regarding the outcome 
of a struggle which is waged for the safety of 
empire and nation and not for provinces, forts, 
and boundaries ? 

The question of victory is therefore for us a 
question of national and moral strength and of 
willingness by the wealthier classes who have still 
to spare when the income of the humbler classes 
is increasingly reduced and in the end ceases 
altogether, to support that part of the popula- 
tion which depends for a livelihood on the pro- 
ceeds of labor and not on the income of property. 
It matters little whether the required funds are 
raised by private organizations or are levied by 
state taxation; in either case, the assistance of 
the government bureaus will be demanded. Ger- 
many will lose this war only if the rich, the 
wealthy, and all those that are assured of a 



Author's Preface xvii 

definite income from investments or steady occu- 
pation will say, " Henceforth the support of the 
unemployed, in other words, the maintenance of 
our country, is too great a sacrifice; henceforth 
we prefer an ignominious peace, (a peace which 
will exclude Germany from the ranks of world 
powers), to the continuous drain on our own 
property by contributions to the sustenance of 
the destitute." 

The test of the moral courage of our leading 
classes is the only real test which we shall have 
to face. To doubt the military efficiency of our 
army is entirely superfluous. If we stand the 
moral test, victory is assured; then, and only 
then, we have truly earned it. If we fail in that 
test, we are not worthy of victory, and neither 
we nor the world at large has any reason to 
bewail our ruin. The public-spirited generosity 
which has so far been exhibited by private indi- 
viduals and corporate societies is a very credit- 
able beginning. But we must remember that it 
is, indeed, only the beginning. No one of us will 
underestimate the amount of guilt and wrong- 
doing which has begun to accumulate in our 
moral life even among us in Germany. Let us 
remember, above all, the stigma of the decr,eas- 
ing birth-rate, the dread of raising children. Let 
us hope that this war will so discipline our nation 
that all the great and good of which the German 
mind is capable will flourish again as of old. 



CONTENTS 

PAGE 

I The Rise of England's World Power .... i 

II Germany's Transformation 12 

III The Policy of Isolation ......... 27 

IV Tension and Reconciliation with England . . 47 
V The Russian Peril 81 

VI The Salient Ideas of Germany's Foreign Policy 107 

VII The War 126 

Appendix 

1 Statement by Sir Edward Grey in the House of 

Commons i55 

2 Speech of Mr. Ramsey Macdonald in Response 

to Statement of Sir Edward Grey 176 

3 Letter by Baron de L'Escaille 179 

Index 183 



GERMANY'S Isolation 



CHAPTER I 

THE RISE OF ENGLAND'S WORLD POWER 

^ I ^HE present-day political interrelation of the 
-*- leading powers and nations dates back to the 
gigantic struggles of the eighteenth century. 
However, the rise of Prussia, as well as the 
Hapsburg- Spanish and the French national poli- 
cies, in so far as Europe and the continent have 
been affected by them, fall well within the limits 
of our own historical consciousness. A detailed 
discussion of them is, therefore, unnecessary. 
This, on the other hand, is not the case with 
the quarrel of a hundred years' standing between 
France and England. Its progress and eventual 
issue are of importance, above all other matters, 
because of their determining influence on the 
political development of the past century. Nor 
can it be said that our fellow citizens versed in 
the art of statesmanship recognize these inner 
connections as clearly as a thorough understand- 
ing of contemporary history seems to demand. 

During the eighteenth century, Europe's rela- 
tion to the colonial world across the sea gained 

1 



2 Germany's Isolation 

a growing significance for the European states, a 
significance even greater than during the age of 
discoveries. On the one hand, actual coloniza- 
tion assumed greater proportions; on the other, 
colonial products were of ever-increasing impor- 
tance in international economy. These facts, 
though incomparable to present-time conditions, 
were forming the very foundations for them. On 
the face of it, England seemed the only, or almost 
only, power ruling beyond the sea, and the Eng- 
lish the great colonizers par excellence. But 
about the middle of the eighteenth century, the 
rivalry between the French colonial policy and 
that of England was far from being settled. In 
India, the two countries were equal in strength, 
while in America, the spacial preponderance of 
the Neo-Latin races over the Anglo-Saxons was 
considerable. By far the greater portion of the 
western continents belonged to the Spaniards, 
Portuguese, and French. On the North American 
continent, Mexico, at that time double its present 
size, and Florida were Spanish possessions ; west 
of the Mississippi, an immense French territory, 
Louisiana — the Land of Louis xiv^ — extended 
into the unexplored north. 

True, the French were unable to settle and 
colonize the land, but they had and held the claim 
to it. The very names of settlements, such as 
New Orleans at the mouth of the Mississippi, 
St. Louis at the confluence of the Mississippi and 



England's World Power 3 

the Missouri, as well as many other names, as 
far as the foothills of the Rocky Mountains and 
extending well into the Canada of today, tell the 
tale of French exploitative ambition in the terri- 
tory between the Gulf of Mexico and the great 
Canadian lakes. Moreover, France owned the 
vast territory extending from the mouth of the 
St. Lawrence along the river basin, thence west 
and south into the interior to the borders of 
Louisiana, in the hinterland of the Alleghanies. 
Thus, not only South America but almost all of 
the North American continent belonged to the 
Neo-Latin nations. If m 1750 a prognosis re- 
garding the future of America had been ventured, 
its terms could have scarcely differed from the 
following : Ibero-Latin-French-Catholic. 

Events took a different turn. They took a 
different turn primarily for the reason that 
France, in the Seven Years' War, attempted to 
attain the impossible, viz., to make war on Prussia 
in Europe, and on England in the colonies and on 
the ocean. Possibly, a more efficient system of 
taxation might have enabled France to back up 
her efforts on the continent and, at the same time, 
satisfy the demands of her naval and colonial 
wars. The French people were rich, but the 
government lacked funds. Yet, under the pres- 
sure of existing conditions, the double-war was 
bound to end disastrously for France. Nothing 
was gained in Europe, and, beyond the sea, 



4 'Germany's Isolation 

England was victorious. After the Seven Years' 
War, France lost out in India, while Canada, at 
that time the cream of the French colonial pos- 
sessions, came under English rule; similarly, the 
territory of Louisiana east of the Mississippi. 
The balance became Spanish, until later, under 
Napoleon, it was made for the second time a 
French domain. 

Such were the events that decided the future 
of North America in favor of the Anglo-Saxon 
world. Another question remained unanswered, 
the question whether England or France was to 
obtain the determining influence on the final 
status of the non-European countries. Although 
the English navy, as early as the eighteenth cen- 
tury, had the ascendency over the French, that 
ascendency was not assured ; on the contrary, the 
French navy held its own on the open seas, and, 
under favorable conditions, had no reason to fear 
an engagement with its English rival. During 
the American war of independence, the French 
men-of-war were fully able to protect the trans- 
port to America of French auxiliary troops. 
Everything depended upon the final status of the 
French naval strength as it would shape itself in 
the midst of the unquestionable rise of the French 
national consciousness during the great revolu- 
tion. The efiiciency of the French nation re- 
vealed itself in all its strength only after the 
abolishment of the worthless system of state 



England's World Power 5 

taxes. Unfortunately, the navy did not profit 
by the total change of affairs, as, contrary to the 
army, it had remained an institution loyal to the 
sovereign. The republican dictators, looking 
upon the royalistic naval officers and crews as 
a danger to the continuance of the republic, 
deprived the navy of the essential support. They 
went even beyond that by allowing it to deterio- 
rate, to degenerate. In less than a decade the 
ancient power of France on the high seas was 
ruined. When Napoleon seized the reins of 
authority, he recognized, no doubt, the necessity 
of a powerful navy, without which France would 
be unable to bring the war with England to a 
favorable conclusion. Yet all his endeavors in 
that direction proved futile; France lacked the 
state of peace indispensable to the restoration of 
the demoralized naval institution. 

Thus it came about that the unadjustable 
divergence of interests of Napoleonic France on 
the one side and of England on the other was 
decided in England's favor. Napoleon's inherit- 
ance, forced upon him by the French revolution, 
consisted in the program of the so-called "natural 
boundaries" of France. The English, however, 
considered a France which would comprise the 
greater portion of the continental North-Sea 
coast intolerable ; for it could be plainly foreseen 
that the possessions of the Netherlands and Bel- 
gium, countries of great riches, industrial effi- 



6 Germany^ s Isolation 

ciency, and seafaring traditions, would render 
France, with her own industry and foreign trade, 
a dangerous competitor, one that would soon 
outstrip England's naval power. 

It was Napoleon's conscious endeavor to create 
a French world policy exceeding by far the 
European limitations, a transoceanic policy in 
the real sense of the word. Owing to England's 
supremacy on the seas, the American domains 
which were still in France's possession could not 
be safely reached or even held. In lieu of them, 
Egypt was to be the corner-stone of a new 
France beyond the water. It is false to historical 
interpretation to look upon Napoleon's expedition 
to Egypt as a mere adventure without an ade- 
quate military and political foundation. Its 
success, however, was entirely dependent upon 
the possibility and method of continued commu- 
nication with the mother country. The Egyptian 
project was bound to fail when the English in 
the battle of Abukir Bay, in 1798, destroyed the 
French fleet which had conveyed the army of 
occupation to Egypt. 

The fate of the expedition to Egypt, though 
exhibiting the naval weakness of France in the 
most glaring light, could not act as a deterrent from 
renewed attempts on the other side of the water. 
The needs of France pointed imperatively to that 
course. The naval treaty with England, 1801, was 
followed immediately by a reorganization of the 
colonial possessions which had suffered greatly by 



England's World Power 7 

the war. . . . But Napoleon's mind reached out 
beyond the mere restoration of the pre-revolution- 
ary state of affairs ; he increased the French colonial 
possessions by (re-) gaining the land of the Missis- 
sippi basin, and cast his eye on Florida and on many 
another province of his weak Spanish neighbor. 
Thus he planned to found a great New France in 
Central America and the southern North America, 
with Louisiana and San Domingo as her principal 
states. The old Bourbonic kingdom had endeavored 
to dispute the claims of the Anglo-Saxons to the 
North-American continent, with the north as a 
point of departure — the young revolutionary power 
made haste to renew these efforts from the south 
and west.''' 

If Napoleon's plans in America had succeeded, 
the future of the continent as an Anglo-Saxon- 
Protestant country over against a Neo-Latin- 
Catholic empire under French rule would again 
have been called in question. Napoleon resumed 
the project of Louis xiv. Spain and all of the 
Spanish possessions in America were to become 
a territory of expansion, subservient to French 
interests, in this case, under the rule of a Napo- 
leonic branch line. North America, between the 
Mississippi and the Pacific Ocean, as a French- 
Spanish possession, would have been a successful 
check to Anglo-Saxon development in its western 
course. That project, like all the previous ones, 
could be carried out only if France were able to 
maintain her sea communication in the face of 
England's naval strength. But, when in 1805 

* Roloff, History of European Colonization. 



8 Germany's Isolation 

England issued victoriously from the naval battle 
at Trafalgar against the forcibly united French 
and Spanish fleets, all hopes for success had to be 
abandoned. 

The battle of Trafalgar marks the turning 
point in the hundred-year struggle between Eng- 
land and France for the supremacy in trans- 
oceanic expansion. As a matter of fact, the 
battle of Trafalgar was potentially lost when the 
French navy was destroyed by the policy of the 
revolutionists. In spite of supreme efforts, it 
proved impossible, while at war with the far 
superior English, to raise the navy to its former 
level of efficiency. Napoleon was active, to the 
degree of severity, in bringing about its restora- 
tion; yet, the mere building of ships and equip- 
ping them with inadequately trained crews, fell 
necessarily short of the purpose, since the hap- 
hazardly raised fighting power lacked that mark 
of intrinsic proficiency in which the English were 
far in the lead. 

Even after the reverses of Trafalgar, Napo- 
leon did not consider his transoceanic and general 
world policy as lost. When the English blocked 
his way across the ocean, he returned to the 
Orient as his field of operation, and here his 
European victories seemed to open up new possi- 
bilities. That policy is plainly revealed after the 
removal, at Austerlitz, of the Austro-Russian 
resistance, and, at Jena, of the Prussian. 



England's World Power 9 

Having in the treaty of Tilsit (1807) made peace 
with Russia and entered into an alliance with the 
Russians, he intended to divide the Turkish empire 
among the three empires, France, Russia, and Aus- 
tria. Egypt as well as extensive littorals of Syria 
and Asia Minor were to become French possessions ; 
besides, he planned with the help of Russia and 
Austria to attack India, on land by way of Persia, 
from the sea with Isle de France (Mauritius), at 
that time still a French possession, as a base. In 
connection with the scheme which was to make 
France the first power in the Near-East and the 
sole ruler in the Indian ocean, he thought of taking 
possession of Algiers. All these enterprises, for 
which he believed the remaining strength of the 
French navy adequate, were intended to serve a 
double purpose : to secure for France the indispen- 
sable colonial territory and to fight England. To 
subdue England in open battle was impossible, but 
after the loss of her East-Indian and Oriental trade, 
she would most probably sue for peace. The cor- 
rectness of the Napoleonic problem has never been 
demonstrated, for a number of events prevented its 
execution. Spain withdrew from her alliance with 
France ; this was followed by a series of continental 
wars, which, in turn, brought about the dissolution 
of the Russian alliance. Napoleon was consequently 
under sentence to carry on his world policy with 
insufficient means ; the sins of the revolution were 
visited upon its heir and conqueror.* 

When, in 181 5, the congress of Vienna 
straightened out the affairs of Europe and the 
rest of the world, there remained but one empire 
whose power reached beyond the seas — England. 
That position she seemed destined to maintain, 

* Roloff. 



10 Germany's Isolation 

or even extend, in the future. For in the begin- 
ning of the nineteenth century the control of the 
sea route to foreign continents served England's 
growing power not less exclusively than did the 
new era of domination over nature, the era of 
mechanical means of intercommunications, of 
railroads, of steamships and telegraphs, the era 
of machinery for spinning and weaving, for 
working iron, wood, and every type of raw 
material. 

Whatever of European commodities, Euro- 
pean technical methods, and European culture 
and civilization during the first two- thirds of the 
past century was carried across the ocean or 
back, traveled almost entirely under the English 
flag. England was the mart for all trading 
activity between Europe and the transmarine 
countries. Not until shortly before the middle 
of the nineteenth century did Germany institute 
something like a direct communication with 
North America. England's gradual rise to a 
world power was plainly assured, owing to her 
cultural and economic influence abroad. There 
were individual territories under other than Eng- 
land's rule, but these were either enclaves, per- 
haps remnants of some non-English colonial 
dominion, or, like Asiatic Russia, compact tracts 
of land without special significance for inter- 
national trade. 

"The world is rapidly turning English" — 



England's World Power 11 

that utterance of an English statesman at the 
end of the nineteenth century, seemed indeed to 
define the inevitable fate of the non-European 
world. Such was the state of conditions at the 
founding of the new German Empire. If about 
the year 1870 the question had been asked, "Is 
there anywhere on the globe the slightest indi- 
cation that a country, save England, or capital, 
save English capital, enjoys the prospects of a 
dominating influence on the economic and polit- 
ical development of nations?" there could have 
been but one answer, " There is not." The great 
East-Indian world was English. China scarcely 
knew of a European flag or a European language 
save the English, and China and India represent 
half of the human race. North America was 
partly English, partly a scion of English culture 
and civilization. In South America, English and 
European, with the exception of Spanish, were 
synonymous terms, Africa was unowned; yet 
every possibility in that unclaimed continent 
seemed England's and England's again. 



CHAPTER II 
Germany's transformation 

A SURVEY aiming to sketch the rise of 
■^ ^ England's world power seems essential to a 
better understanding of the political problems 
under discussion. These problems arose at the 
very moment it became apparent that Germany 
had become the potential rival of England's 
activity in world politics. Recent as Germany's 
interests were, they gave promise of modifying 
the century-old and seemingly final decisions 
regarding the apportionment and mastery of the 
world — decisions forced upon Europe by the 
Seven Years' War and the Napoleonic epoch. Not 
only Germany herself but the entire continent 
was struck with the suddenness of the change. 
To illustrate the point in question, let us recall 
a curious incident which occurred during the 
brief reign of Frederic iii, towards the end of 
the period during which Bismarck conducted the 
political affairs of the empire. 

Alexander of Battenberg, ex-prince of Bul- 
garia, had sued for the hand of a Prussian 
princess. As the result of a clash with the ruling 
interests of Russia, he had been exiled from 
12 



Germany's Transformation 13 

Bulgaria. In a certain sense, however, he re- 
mained pretender to the throne, and a marriage 
with the sister of the German emperor would 
have vastly improved his prospects. For that 
very reason, demands on the Prussian-German 
diplomacy would not have been wanting, as the 
prince was eager to regain his princely position 
in the Balkans. Obviously, Russia would have 
taken offense at the proposed move. So, not to 
involve Germany in the imminent conflict, Bis- 
marck opposed the Hohenzollern-Battenberg 
match with unchecked and characteristic reck- 
lessness. He coined the phrase, oft since quoted, 
" For us the Balkan is not worth the bones of a 
Pommeranian musketeer." That was indeed a 
confession of Germany's disinterestedness in 
world politics, a confession unparalleled in the 
boldness of its wording; for the Turkish Orient 
was the very focus of political questions which 
concerned themselves with matters transcending 
the immediate interests of the powers in central 
Europe. If Germany was not even interested in 
the European East, the question is justified, 
"Why take any interest in the rest of the world?" 
The frankness with which Germany disclaimed 
any interest in world politics was, a few years 
later, emphatically confirmed by the act of a 
foreign power. In 1890 England ceded to Ger- 
many the island of Helgoland. For that trans- 
action she was well paid, as Germany gave up 



14 Germany's Isolation 

many and by no means unimportant claims in 
Africa in exchange for the island. To realize 
the importance of England's step, it is but neces- 
sary to ask, " What price would the English pay 
today in order to regain Helgoland? " If Helgo- 
land were today an English possession, Germany 
would probably not have been able to strengthen 
her navy to such a formidable degree as to arouse 
England's notice and apprehension. But no 
matter whether or not she would have attained 
that end, certain it is that a successful engage- 
ment of her naval forces with an English armada 
would be entirely out of the question. More 
than that; in case of war, Germany would be at 
England's mercy, as Helgoland controls a num- 
ber of important strategic points — the inlets of 
the three rivers Elbe, Weser, and Jahde, as well 
as the entrance to the Kaiser Wilhelm Canal. 
Manifestly, England, when ceding Helgoland, 
was far from entertaining even the remotest 
suspicion that some time in the future Germany 
could grow into a world power with far-reaching 
interests which might seriously cross English 
foreign policies. Bismarck's utterance regarding 
the Balkan, as well as England's cession of Hel- 
goland, impressively confirm the fact that two 
decades after the founding of the empire Ger- 
many was still far from displaying even a remote 
interest in a world policy. 

Exactly twenty-five years after Bismarck had 



Germany's Transformation 15 

voiced his opposition to the Battenberg marriage, 
with a view of preventing a clash with Russia in 
matters pertaining to the Orient, Germany was 
compelled to interfere, with the full weight of 
her armed forces, in a question which was des- 
tined to lead her infinitely farther into the Orient 
than her previous policy had kept her from 
entering it. Early in 1913, Russia threatened to 
send her troops into Turkish Armenia in order 
to bring Turkey to terms regarding the demands 
of the allied Balkans. Geographically as well as 
topographically Armenia is the key to the Anato- 
lian peninsula and the lowlands of Mesopotamia. 
In the hands of Russia, that key would have shut 
out Turkey from the possibility of maintaining 
her independence. Germany, being greatly inter- 
ested in the continued independence of the Turk- 
ish empire, notified Russia that the peace of 
Europe was endangered if Russian troops crossed 
the Armenian frontiers. There could be no doubt 
as to the meaning of Germany's message. The 
Russian invasion of Armenia was not carried 
out, the Turkish catastrophe thus being averted. 
What strange forces in the internal affairs of the 
German empire must have been at work to bring 
about that complete change of attitude toward 
the Orient ! 

Tracing the development and the controlling 
influences in the internal affairs of Germany from 
the reestablishment of the empire to the present 



16 Germany's Isolation 

day, it seems that the economic changes in the 
life of the nation demand our first and undivided 
attention. Next in importance is a comprehensive 
study of the political consequences which deter- 
mined not only the present political status of 
Germany but also the rise of a national conscious- 
ness and her standing in the judgment of other 
nations. Strange to say, the development of a 
German national consciousness has been consider- 
ably slower than the growth of its material and 
political basis. The appreciation of Germany's 
present relation to the rest of the world is, in the 
case of most Germans, younger by a decade or 
two than her actual participation in universal 
economics. It should be added that the slow 
process of developing a consciousness of national 
power from its inception to its full realization, 
at times endangered Germany's prospects of be- 
coming a world power of the first rank. Certain 
political factions, for instance, employed their 
so-called conservative principles in a lasting 
opposition to every proposed increase of army 
or navy. 

The political interests of any great nation rest 
invariably on the nature and extent of its eco- 
nomic life. In turn, the most accurate standard 
of modern economic activity is supplied by sta- 
tistics on the foreign trade of the nation. Ten 
years after the founding of the German empire 
the joint values of her exports and imports 



Germany's Transformation 17 

amounted to about one and one-quarter billion 
dollars. By 1891 the exports had grown to about 
seven-eighths of a billion dollars, the imports to 
something less than one and one-quarter billion 
dollars. Again, a decade later the value of her 
exports had been increased by three-eighths of a 
billion dollars, that of her imports by almost one- 
half a billion dollars, so that in 1902 her entire 
imports amounted to about one and one-half 
billion dollars, her exports to about one and one- 
quarter billion dollars. Accordingly, Germany's 
foreign trade about doubled its value within a 
period of twenty-two years. 

In the year 1902, German economic activity 
began to increase by leaps and bounds. Within 
the six years following, between 1902 and 1907, 
import and export trade had increased more than 
within the preceding period from 1881 to 1902, 
a space of time nearly four times as long. The 
total German foreign trade, which in 1902 was 
valued at about two and three-quarter billion 
dollars, amounted in 1907 to about four and 
one-quarter billion dollars, with an annual in- 
crease of more than one-quarter billion dollars. 
Thus it has been shown that Germany's eco- 
nomic life measured in terms of her foreign 
trade after the reestablishment of the empire, 
progressed at first slowly, then somewhat faster, 
and since the beginning of the twentieth cen* 
tury at an almost unparalleled rate. Bismarck's 



18 Germany's Isolation 

avowal of German disinterestedness and Eng- 
land's cession of Helgoland fall within the period 
of moderate growth. It is safe to suppose that 
England would not have decided upon so por- 
tentous a step if at that time Germany's share in 
international trade had assumed the flourishing 
proportions which characterized its growth after 
the year 1902. 

The panic of 1908-9, which affected not only 
the German empire but also all other great cen- 
ters of trade, temporarily arrested the economic 
progress. But since that time a renewed impetus 
in trading activity relieved the passing stringency. 
In 1 9 12 Germany's foreign trade passed the five 
billion dollar mark. In 1890, the year of the 
so-called Zanzibar-Helgoland treaty, the total 
foreign trade of Germany amounted quantita- 
tively to less than England's imports; in actual 
value, to about one-half of it. Ten years later 
Germany's foreign trade, compared with that of 
England, had assumed the ratio of 11:18. At 
the present time the ratio is 21:27. Twenty 
years ago, when Helgoland became German, it 
was regarded a fantastic and preposterous 
thought for Germany to rival England in her 
international commerce. What at that time 
seemed next to impossible may now be viewed 
as the accomplished task of another decade. 

Let us examine further. In 1890, not only 
England but even France was Germany's com- 



Germany's Transformation 19 

mercial superior. Shortly before that time the 
Germans had thought it too great a venture to 
build warships or commercial vessels of a larger 
type on their own wharfs. In 1885 the North 
German Lloyd displayed considerable reluctance 
in accepting certain conditions attached to the 
imperial mail service to the Orient. The govern- 
ment, in subsidizing Lloyd steamers for that 
purpose, had demanded that all boats carrying 
mail to and from the Far East were to be built 
in Germany from German building material. 
Today Germany's largest, fastest, and most 
modern men-of-war are German-built, not a ton 
of the material employed having been imported 
from abroad. Moreover, Germany leads the 
nations of the earth in the building of ocean 
liners, and may boast of claiming the two largest 
steamship companies in the world as her own. 
A superficial comparison of Germany's foreign 
trade of a generation ago with that of today 
leads to the conviction that the numerical evolu- 
tion observed, necessarily expresses a complete 
change in the conditions governing the economic 
life of the country. In the first half of the 
eighties, Germany for the last time exported part 
of her surplus grain. To our present generation 
it seems well-nigh incredible that Germany as 
late as three decades ago produced a quantity of 
grain sufficiently large to permit its exportation 
to other countries. Yet such were the facts. 



20 Germany's Isolation 

At that time a hostile blockade of Germany's 
foreign trade on land and sea would have been, 
if not a matter of indifference, at least no fatal 
arrest of her economic life. 

At the founding of the new German empire, 
the exports of manufactured articles exceeded 
the imports by only a few hundred million marks. 
The domestic food supply was greater than 
needed, and luxuries from foreign countries 
could have been dispensed with. Besides, the 
various industries of the empire were in no sense 
as dependent for their raw material on foreign 
markets as they are at the present time. If, on 
the other hand, today Germany's opponents, in 
the event of a war, could succeed for any length 
of time in cutting off the supply of foreign raw 
material and foodstuffs, and at the same time 
blocking her export trade in manufactured arti- 
cles, the result would be disastrous for the 
economic life of the nation. Almost her entire 
industrial activity, notably the textile, metal, 
wood, and leather branches, would be so seriously 
affected as to bring dire suffering to half of the 
population. 

Formerly the Germans lived preeminently on 
the proceeds of their domestic industry and re- 
sources, today they depend preeminently on their 
commercial intercourse with the world at large. 
Germany's system of training, second to none, 
her progress along technical and scientific lines, 



Germany's Transformation 21 

and the effect of such progress in the manufac- 
turing field, have all helped to engender a power- 
ful creative energy trembling in every fiber of 
her industrial life. What is the value of a pound 
of pig-iron? Perhaps a penny or two. What is 
the value of that same pound of iron when 
wrought, say, into mainsprings for watches? 
Upward to twenty-five hundred dollars. Thus 
Germany refines the raw material, which she 
collects from everywhere — cotton, wool, wood, 
skins, metal, India rubber, oil seeds, oil, and in 
the process of refinement applies to it the results 
of her scientific research, her technical skill, her 
ingenuity, and her taste; in other words, her 
entire intellectual capital. 

The finished product is now placed upon the 
market. From all over the world the nations 
come and buy her valuable commodities, and 
the price paid for them, in turn, serves a three- 
fold purpose. It pays for new raw material; 
it yields the means of sustenance with life's ever- 
growing demands; thirdly, it increases in no 
small measure the national wealth of the people. 
When the German import and export trade 
amounted to only one and one-quarter billion 
dollars, the returns of her national industries 
were insignificant indeed; today, with the value 
of foreign trade multiplied many times over, the 
financial gain must have assumed enormous 
dimensions. 



22 Germany's Isolation 

Twenty years ago, G. von Schmoller estimated 
the national wealth of Germany at fifty billion 
dollars. Today, no less an authority than Mr, 
Helfferich, president of the Deutsche Bank, rates 
it at seventy-five billion dollars; while the na- 
tional economist, Steinmann-Bucher, fixes the 
amount at close to one hundred billion. Even 
on the basis of Helfferich's conservative esti- 
mate, Germany's total wealth exceeds today that 
of either England or France, though his per 
capita figures fall somewhat below those of the 
English and French. Following are Helfferich's 
figures: France, fifteen hundred dollars per 
capita; England, about twelve hundred and fifty 
dollars per capita ; Germany, not quite one thou- 
sand dollars per capita. According to Steinmann- 
Bucher, Germany's per capita rate now equals 
that of France. For the present purpose, how- 
ever, it seems of little moment whether or not 
Germany's wealth exceeds that of her rivals- 
One fact, and one only, stands out with con- 
vincing prominence, viz., Germany's tremendous 
growth in earning power. Helfferich places that 
growth, in the light of recent statistics, at from 
one and one-half billion to three billion dollars 
annually, an increase traceable to no other source 
than Germany's unmatched success in world 
economics. Deprived of, or substantially lim- 
ited in, her free access to the world markets, her 
industrial life would suffer acute reverses. 



Germany's Transformation 23 

Germany's growth as an economic power 
among the nations is not less reflected in the 
status of emigration, which, startling as it seemed 
a generation ago, has now decreased to almost 
imperceptible numbers. In fact, the tables seem 
to be turned ; Germany's population is materially 
increased by immigration. In 1882, when Ger- 
many's population amounted to about forty-six 
million souls, two hundred and twenty thousand 
inhabitants left their native country for a lack of 
opportunity to develop. Within the ten years 
following, the annual loss thus incurred averaged 
one hundred and fifty thousand, more or less. 
It will be remembered that at that time Ger- 
many's foreign trade contributed but little to her 
industrial and national life. Today, her popu- 
lation has all but reached the seventy-million 
mark ; at the same time, the annual emigration ^ 
dropped to about fifteen thousand souls. Al- 
though having gained more than twenty million 
inhabitants, the country is able today to retain 
its normal annual growth of eight hundred thou- 
sand people, year after year, and to find occu- 
pation and sustenance for all of them. Besides, 
its working forces are supplemented by a large 
foreign contingent. Such a development could 
not be foreseen in 1890, the year of the Zanzibar- 
Helgoland treaty. While the growth of Ger- 
many's population was even at that time a matter 
of general knowledge, it remained an open ques- 



24 Germany's Isolation 

tion if the increasing masses could be supported 
by her own resources. 

In less than ten years after the first Anglo- 
German treaty of 1890, a beginning reaction of 
Germany's gradual transformation made itself 
felt in her foreign policy. In 1897, the Germans 
occupied Kiao-chow; in 1898, the emperor vis- 
ited Constantinople, Jerusalem, and Damascus. 
The first of these two events called forth less 
discontentment in England than in Russia; for 
Russia, at that time, viewed all of northern China 
as a territory of paramount interest to her foreign 
policy. But when, in the course of the second 
event, the emperor, on his visit to Saladin's grave, 
laid down a kind of platform of friendly rela- 
tions, politically speaking, between the German 
empire and the Mohammedan world, when it 
became known that German officers acted as 
instructors to the Turkish army, and when, in 
connection with the emperor's journey, the 
project of a Bagdad railroad assumed a more 
definite shape, England began to take notice and 
to display signs of growing nervousness. Only 
a short time had passed since English public 
opinion had been stirred up by another act of 
the German foreign policy, the congratulatory 
telegram of the emperor to President Kriiger 
of Transvaal, at the imprisonment of the Jame- 
son expeditionary forces near Burghersdorp. It 
seems that China, Mesopotamia, and South 



Germany's Transformation 25 

Africa offered adequate grounds for fear of 
Germany's ambition, which appeared to have 
sprung into existence from nowhere. English 
public opinion, ever excitable as it is, not less 
than responsible statesmen of the British empire, 
seemed to apprehend a growing danger at the 
hands of Germany's startling political moves. 

In the summer of 1900 — England had not 
yet succeeded in subjecting the Boers — the 
German government submitted its great naval 
bill to the Reichstag. Two years prior. Secre- 
tary of State von Tirpitz had succeeded in 
bringing about a minor increase of the German 
naval forces. The program of 1900, however, 
was bound to cause a sensation by its very size, 
its completeness, and by the vast period of time 
which it covered. Yet the detailed and most 
impressive reasons supporting the bill and pub- 
lished by direction of the navy department, 
readily convinced competent authorities in Ger- 
many and abroad that the new naval program 
served but one purpose, viz., to express politically 
the vast changes in Germany's economic condi- 
tions. Little as in 1900 her commercial interests 
over the sea may be compared with those of the 
present time, and viewed, from a modern stand- 
point, as anything more than a mere beginning 
of Germany's actual development, it seemed yet 
certain that her growth would necessarily revo- 
lutionize her economic life from its very founda- 



26 Germany's Isolation 

tion. Experience verified the correctness of that 
assumption. Yet not until after the navy depart- 
ment had conducted its campaign of enlighten- 
ment, by way of commentary to the naval bill, 
did the whole truth of the matter become a con- 
stantly growing factor in the consciousness of 
the nation. And yet it seems imperative un- 
tiringly to point out Germany's absolute depend- 
ence on the proceeds of her foreign trade, which, 
as time rolls by, must bear an ever-increasing 
burden of her economic existence. 



CHAPTER III 

THE POLICY OF ISOLATION 

GERMANY'S successive political moves, be- 
ginning with the occupation of Kiao-chow, 
the Kriiger telegram, and the emperor's trip to 
the Orient, and ending with the naval bill of 
1900, constituted, perhaps by themselves, suffi- 
cient ground for England's beginning uneasiness. 
Nor had England misjudged the interrelation 
of Germany's policy and her economic growth, 
though, strangely enough, without acknowledg- 
ing it as a necessary consequence. Winston 
Churchill, the English First Lord of the Admir- 
alty, expressed the difference between the Eng- 
lish navy and that of Germany in the well-known 
statement, "England's navy is a necessity; Ger- 
many's, more of a luxury." He emphatically de- 
nied the correctness of the assumption that the 
concern for the navy was founded on equal con- 
ditions in the two countries. There is no reason 
to doubt the sincerity of Churchill's words, but 
it cannot be denied that they betray a curious and 
unfair trend of political mind. 

Strength, and nothing but strength, ever deter- 
mines the political respect for the life interests 

27 



28 Germany's Isolation 

of a rival nation. History knows of no exception. 
Only as long as we are strong we may be certain 
that, in the mind of our envious neighbor, desire 
and better judgment counterbalance each other. 
If we lack strength, without being so insignificant 
that our very weakness is our protection, we may 
be certain that our rival, yielding to the natural 
and irresistible law of necessity, will in an oppor- 
tune moment satisfy his desires at our expense. 
England would certainly not have failed to avail 
herself of that law of necessity if she had noticed 
Germany's growing commerce competing with 
and encroaching on her own interests, without a 
corresponding increase in the German military 
defense. 

A casual observer, acquainted in some measure 
with the motives that actuated the foreign policy 
of Germany since the second half of the nineties, 
will emphatically deny any allegation that Ger- 
many ever assumed a threatening attitude toward 
England. Her sole object was to establish, pri- 
marily, ways and means for the support and 
expansion of her trading operations abroad, and 
only in the second place preventive measures, 
safeguarding her interests against hostile attacks. 
Despite this fact, England persistently interprets 
the German foreign policy, more especially that 
pertaining to the Orient, either as a menace to 
her own freedom of decision in political affairs, 
or as a forceful pressure to respect the wishes of 



The Policy of Isolation 29 

the German government. From that very stand- 
point, England watched, with growing concern, 
the increase of the German navy, and, above 
all, the project of the Bagdad railroad. 

From the very first, the Bagdad railroad was 
intended to connect Constantinople and the mili- 
tary bases of Turkey, in Asia Minor, directly 
with Syria and the provinces at the Tigris and 
Euphrates. It seemed a matter of course that 
the railroad planned was, at the same time, likely 
to develop Turkey's economic and financial 
strength, which, in turn, was capable of grow- 
ing into a power of latent political significance. 
England had her misgivings ; could not the whole 
plan be a threat or even a plot calculated to 
undermine England's position in Egypt? It was 
but natural to suppose that the Bagdad railroad,' 
jointly with the Syrian and Arabian lines, which 
were partly planned, partly either building or 
completed, might serve the transport of Turkish 
troops in the direction of Egypt. The junction 
of the Bagdad railroad with the Syrian lines is 
today all but an accomplished fact, awaiting only 
the completion of the Taurus and Amanus tun- 
nels; and yet a distance of four hundred kilo- 
meters untraversed by rails separates Haifa, the 
railroad terminal at the foot of the Carmel 
promontory, from the Suez canal. But even 
that distance could, in the event of war, be cov- 
ered by a large army, particularly with the assist- 



30 Germany's Isolation 

ance of so-called field railroads. Granting a 
German-Turkish alliance and other conditions 
less easily realized, there is no denying that the 
Bagdad railroad is equal to a political life 
insurance for Germany. 

In spite of all these facts, there is not the 
slightest reason for assuming that Germany 
would ever attack England, except possibly the 
one that, after the fashion of Frederick the Great 
in the Seven Years' War, she may want to fore- 
stall a hostile English surprise, concerning which 
she had previously received definite information. 
Such a case would make her, before the world, 
the aggressor, while, in reality, her move would 
clearly be defensive. In any case, war with 
England would mean for Germany a risk of the 
gravest consequences. No need of describing 
the results if England were victorious. If Ger- 
many would win, she would scarcely be able to 
enjoy the fruits of her victory, for in that self- 
same moment Europe would unite in arms 
against the threatening ascendency of her power. 

Impossible and illogical as the plan of a 
German attack appears to the reasoning mind, 
England persisted in her belief — or did she find 
the thought intolerable that the Bagdad railroad 
may at some future period serve Gennany's 
interests abroad ? Egypt controls the Suez canal, 
and the Suez canal is England's short cut to 
India, Eastern Asia, Australia, and East Africa, 



r 



The Policy of Isolation 31 



If England some day lost her control over the 
canal, she could communicate with her posses- 
sions in the Indian and Pacific oceans only by 
way of the troublesome route around the Cape 
of Good Hope. That fact alone may endanger 
her position in East India. Neither is South 
Africa longer an assured English possession. 
South Africa is today governed by Africans 
speaking the Dutch tongue, the former Boers, 
for whom that term seems less and less appro- 
priate. Before the great South African war, 
the Africans were "Boers" in fact — peasants 
with a character peculiar to the tillers of the soil. 
If a Boer had six sons and six daughters, the 
daughters were sure to marry young Boer farm- 
ers, probably cattle raisers, and the sons would 
turn to the occupation of their father, partly on 
the open territory adjoining the frontiers of the 
settlement, partly on the land already improved, 
which for their benefit was cut up into sub- 
divisions. That system was made possible by 
the constant rise of land values under the in- 
fluence of a flourishing mining industry. But 
even during the great South African war, condi- 
tions began to change, as only part of the rising 
generation took up farming as a business. Today 
it is not rare to see young Africans in positions 
which were formerly filled exclusively by Eng- 
lishmen from England, men of a metropolitan- 
imperialistic trend of mind. We meet young 



32 Germany's Isolation 

Africans in every kind of responsible positions 
and callings — as business men, bankers, engi- 
neers, lawyers, etc. The British element in 
South Africa thus lost most of its traditional 
privileges. 

The fact that the Boers regained their auton- 
omy only after their defeat, the origin and rise 
of the South African Union, and the present 
status of the native population in responsible 
and commanding positions, are all evidences of 
a thorough transformation in the character of 
the country. It will be remembered that during 
the great South African strike, early in 19 14, the 
South African government, under General Louis 
Botha, former Boer general in the war with 
England, made short work of the English labor 
leaders by ordering them out of the country and, 
without ceremony, sending them to England. 
That they were English subjects like the Boers 
themselves, at least in name, did not change 
matters in the least. The government justified 
its act by the provision that undesirable aliens 
must at all hazards be deported. 

Applied to English subjects in South Africa, 
that act seemed, after all, a questionable proceed- 
ing; yet the British government had no means 
to prevent it. Similarly, the armed forces of 
South Africa, except the relatively small number 
of regular Imperials, are under the control of 
the Boer government. England could therefore 



The Policy of Isolation 38 

under no circumstances hope to subject South 
Africa in case that country some day should 
want to be independent. A repetition of the 
Boer war, as waged fifteen years ago, is impos- 
sible; nor does there seem to be any doubt that 
the countries between the Cape and the Zambesi 
are part and parcel of the British empire only 
by the good will and a prevailing practical 
interest of the Dutch South Africans. 

The state of affairs in South Africa, as set 
forth, most naturally renders the continued con- 
trol of Egypt of supreme importance for Eng- 
land. Moreover, it explains the solicitous manner 
with which that country watches over Egypt. In 
the last few years of old Queen Victoria, the 
English foreign policy exhibited a certain reluc- 
tance in deciding upon political moves of great 
importance— an attitude easily explained by a 
fitting regard for the advanced age of the sover- 
eign, and paralleled by the recent policy of 
Austria-Hungary. No sooner had the queen 
passed away, and Edward vii ascended the 
British throne, than a change in the English 
policy with regard to the Orient became 
noticeable. 

During the first years of King Edward's rule, 
England seemed to waver between two plans. 
Germany's expansion, in so far as England's 
interests may be endangered by it, must be either 
checked, by a so-called entente cordiale, or para- 



34 Germany's Isolation 

lyzed by means of a plan later known as the 
policy of isolation. A publication from a 
Japanese source, a few years ago, leaves no 
doubt that an effort along the line of the first 
alternative had actually been launched. An 
attempt had been made to bring about an English- 
German- Japanese entente directed against Rus- 
sia. Two reasons, among other considerations, 
prompted the German diplomacy to reject the 
proposals put forth, viz., a prudent regard for 
Russia, and certain obligations which, in all 
probability, would be demanded by the terms of 
the new treaty — limitations likely to hamper 
Germany's freedom of action in the Orient and 
in other parts of the world. 

Above all, Germany was compelled to decline 
because she lacked the necessary strength for an 
alliance with England. England, thereupon, 
sought to accomplish her purpose more directly, 
though there is no doubt that a friendly agree- 
ment with Germany eventually would have served 
a similar end. Her goal was no other than to 
sever Arabia, the countries adjoining the Euphra- 
tes and Tigris, and southern Syria from Turkey, 
with a view of incorporating them, in some 
fashion or other, into the enormous territory 
under her domination. If England were able to 
exercise a political control, assured against hos- 
tile influence, over the territory between the Gulf 
of Persia and the eastern Mediterranean coast. 



The Policy of Isolation 35 

she may look upon Egypt as immune from 
attack. Even the completion of a railroad, such 
as the present German-Turkish plan of a Bagdad 
line, could not endanger the security of that 
country. An unquestionable advantage would 
be gained by England if she were able to carry 
out- the plan of her own Bagdad railroad, which 
was designed as something of a counterpart to 
the German railroad, so called. 

The English railroad, not less than the Ger- 
man, was planned to start from some point at 
the Gulf of Persia, that is to say, at the edge of 
a body of water under direct and efficient control 
of the English. Beyond Bagdad, the English 
railroad, unlike the German, would not have 
crossed to Asia Minor by way of Mesopotamia 
and Syria, but would have run along the Euphra- 
tes across the Oasis of Palmyra, and thence, by 
way of either Damascus or some other town, to 
the Mediterranean Sea. The western terminal 
at the coast would thus have been flanked by the 
English positions, respectively, in Egypt and on 
the island of Cyprus. 

It is difficult to picture something of greater 
interest to England than the plan of the Bagdad 
railroad as worked out by the noted engineer, 
Willcocks. Syria, Mesopotamia, Babylonia, and 
Arabia would be opened to economic develop- 
ment, and, at the same time, come under Eng- 
land's most rigid supervision. Besides, Constan- 



36 Germany's Isolation 

tinople and Anatolia, the centers of Turkey's 
military and political administration, would be 
entirely out of touch with the newly opened 
territories. Efforts have not been lacking, on 
the part of England, to support the plan of her 
Bagdad railroad by plausible economic argumen- 
tation. It was set forth that only by rail the 
future products of the extensive Babylonian 
irrigation land could be carried to the Mediter- 
ranean Sea at low freight rates; on the other 
hand, the long Bagdad railroad would not pay 
if the said products would travel on sea through 
the Gulf of Persia and the Suez canal. On its 
face, that argument seems sound ; yet upon exam- 
ination it will be found untenable for the follow- 
ing reason: The tracks of the railroad planned 
by England lead, for a greater part, through a 
waterless desert, while those of the German- 
Turkish line pass partly through well-cultivated 
land, partly over tracts capable of the best pos- 
sible cultivation. Besides, the freight rates, even 
for the direct Bagdad-Mediterranean traffic, 
would be scarcely higher than those provided by 
the English project now abandoned. No doubt 
Germany would have been forced to accept Eng- 
land's plan if, after the Boer war, she had joined 
with her and Japan in an English-German- 
Japanese alliance. 

About the time when King Edward took over 
the scepter from Queen Victoria, Willcocks, 



The Policy of Isolation 87 

England's distinguished creator of her Bagdad 
railroad plans, revealed, in a most noteworthy 
publication, the aims of the English policy re- 
garding the vast plain between the Lebanon 
Mountains and the mouth of the Euphrates and 
Tigris. In a lecture given in the winter of 1900- 
190 1, before the Geographical Society in Cairo, 
he declared that the restoration of Babylon's 
ancient cultivation on the basis of figures pre- 
pared by officers of the Anglo-Indian surveying 
service was but half of the task; English engi- 
neers and English capital would accomplish that 
share of the enterprise. But it would certainly 
be of equal importance to settle the newly re- 
gained land with English subjects, emigrants 
from Egypt and East India. By that proposal, 
Willcocks laid bare his thorough understanding 
of the difficulties involved. It is indeed easier to 
build a system of dams, canals, and locks to 
restore the productive Babylon of antiquity and 
of the early Arabian era than to procure the 
many millions of people necessary to cultivate 
the land to be reclaimed. 

However, the plan of an immigration, on an 
enormous scale, into Babylon, from the adjoining 
countries of the British empire, carries with it 
the conviction of overt political intentions; for 
it is difficult to conceive that English subjects, on 
arriving in Babylon, become naturalized Turkish 
subjects. Not satisfied with disclosing, from the 



38 Germany's Isolation 

very start, the political character inherent in the 
policy of settling Babylonia, Will cocks placed 
his idea on a particularly anti-German platform 
by raising the insidious question as to what name 
would be given to the great canal, the principal 
source of irrigation for the land around Bag- 
dad — the canal of the Emperor of India or the 
canal of the Emperor of Germany. 

The policy of England could have scarcely 
been expressed in terms more transparent. For 
that reason, Lord Curzon's address, delivered 
at about the same time as Willcocks' lecture in 
Cairo, serves but as a verification of a fact previ- 
ously known. In a speech anent the East Indian 
budget, Curzon, at that time viceroy of India, 
emphatically declared it was more than time for 
England to remember the political necessity of 
claiming the entire "Middle East" as a territory 
of her particular interests. The "Middle East" 
referred to by the viceroy was no less than all 
lands between the two entrances to the Indian 
Ocean, respectively at Suez and at Singapore, 
India, and the land adjoining, Arabia, Persia, 
the Gulf of Persia and the vast tracts west of 
it as far as the Mediterranean Sea. 

In connection with the English plan to estab- 
lish a protectorate over the land around Bagdad 
and adjoining the Bagdad railroad, it should be 
remembered that England was no longer inter- 
ested in the conservation of the Turkish posses- 



The Policy of Isolation 89 

sions, a cause which she had resolutely espoused 
as late as 1878 at the congress of Berlin. The 
change in England's attitude dates back to the 
moment when she looked upon Turkey no longer 
as a wall that would effectually stop the Russian 
expansion, but rather as a pawn in the political 
chess of Germany. The idea of Turkey's terri- 
torial integrity was now usurped by a thought of 
an entirely different kind, viz., the establishment 
of a vast Mohammedan commonwealth under 
English protection, a commonwealth, no longer 
led by the Turkish, but by the Arabian element. 
Even as matters are, the Turks are not well 
liked in those districts of their own country where 
the Arabian language is spoken. Not later than 
fifteen years ago, for example, there was men- 
tion, in both Bagdad and Damascus, of the for- 
eign yoke of the Turkish barbarians. If Turkey 
were to lose these provinces, the position of the 
Turkish sultan as Caliph, that is, as the spiritual 
ruler of all faithful, would become untenable. 
In that event, the head of the most important 
"Arabian" country, the Khedive of Egypt, is 
the logical candidate for the position as Caliph. 
The Khedive is an English vassal, a fact which 
will certainly contribute to the furtherance of 
England's schemes. Bagdad, Mecca, Jerusalem, 
Cairo, perhaps even Damascus, would have be- 
come cities in the empire of the new Egyptian- 
Arabian Caliph, cities under the supreme guar- 



40 Germany's Isolation 

dianship of England. One fact alone: Mecca 
under the protectorate of England, would be an 
invaluable guaranty for the security of English 
possessions in the Mohammedan empire, above 
all, in India. 

No mistake can be made if the ideas set forth 
above are considered as the final goal of England, 
ideas which originated at the beginning of King 
Edward's reign and occupied her foreign policy 
for ten years after the unsuccessful attempt to 
isolate Germany by means of an alliance. The 
king must have been convinced that the desired 
operation on the political body of the Turkish 
empire, if successful, would arouse Germany's 
opposition or even active resistance. He must 
have known that the dissolution of the Turkish 
empire would be a severe blow to the safety of 
Germany's political interests. England's next 
move was, therefore, to produce a political com- 
bination of such strength that Germany either did 
not venture resistance or, if she did, would be 
crushed into submission. 

England's success hinged, above anything else, 
on the cooperation of Russia and France. 
Russia, no doubt, was very strong and seemed 
little inclined to lend herself to an English policy 
calculated to deprive Turkey of her possessions 
outside of Asia Minor, without paying due regard 
to the traditional Russian aspirations in the 
Orient. To make the government of the Czar 



The Policy of Isolation 41 

subservient to England's aims it was therefore 
necessary, above all, to weaken the empire, a task 
accomplished by an Anglo- Japanese alliance and 
Japan's subsequent declaration of war on Russia. 
England's purpose to reduce Russia's power and 
pride was gained as the result of the Russo- 
Japanese war; true enough, to a far greater 
extent than England had expected; for in the 
decisive moment the very opposite of the much 
desired effect took place. Two years after peace 
between the warring nations had been concluded, 
an Anglo-Russian treaty regarding Persia, 
Afghanistan, Tibet, etc., was signed (1907). 
According to the terms of that treaty, at least of 
the portion made public, the boundaries of the 
disputed territory in Central Asia were fixed and 
Persia was divided into a Russian, an English, 
and an ostensibly neutral zone of influence. 
Besides, a settlement of the Turkish question was 
provided in a way that corresponded entirely 
with England's wishes and yet permitted Russia's 
participation in the business on hand. 

Meanwhile, England had come to an under- 
standing with France, by conceding to her the 
claim to Morocco. In official recognition of that 
most important concession, France acknowledged, 
without reserve, all paramount rights and privi- 
leges of England in Egypt. Fair and just as 
that exchange appeared, the close observer could 
not fail to see that the acquisition of Morocco 



42 Germany's Isolation 

was an infinitely greater gain for France than 
the ultimate renunciation of her former wishes 
in Egypt was a loss. Obviously, the improbable 
equation Morocco = Egypt covered something 
of importance. And important it was indeed. 
England gained not only France's assurance of 
political disinterestedness in Egypt, a concession 
of no practical moment, but also her consent for 
the undisturbed pursuance of England's policy 
in the Orient. 

Insignificant as the English-French business 
transaction regarding Morocco' seemed, particu- 
larly in its early stages, it was destined to cause 
a conflict with Germany. German diplomacy 
was not so innocent as to interpret the Morocco 
affair on its face value, and, having discovered 
the actual facts in the case, could not afford to 
play the role of a disinterested spectator. More- 
over, England and France had negotiated con- 
cerning Morocco without notifying Germany, or, 
what seems still more striking, without even 
preserving the outward form of diplomatic 
respect for her government. Was Germany will- 
ing to suffer a loss of prestige? Would she not 
insist, despite the critical character of the situa- 
tion, that the Morocco negotiations be reopened 
and no decision be considered final without her 
consent ? 

It is only natural that Germany's forthcoming 
demand of a European conference anent the 



The Policy of Isolation 43 

Morocco affair should meet with opposition, par- 
ticularly with that of France. No doubt, Ger- 
many would not only disapprove of part of the 
program but, in all probability, formulate con- 
ditions of her own. The German demands were 
not long wanting. In substance they amounted 
to this, that France and England should present 
the terms of the Morocco contract before the 
conference and consent to a thoroughgoing re- 
vision of all details, not without looking to the 
interests of the offended party. That under the 
prevailing circumstances France agreed to the 
so-called Algeciras conference, must certainly be 
looked upon as a formal and material victory of 
German diplomacy. 

French opposition, it will be remembered, was 
at that time so strong that Delcasse, the French 
secretary of foreign affairs, in the summer of 
1905, was ready to declare war. The majority of 
his colleagues objected, first, because Russia, on 
account of the after-effects of her war with Ja- 
pan, was unable to take part, and secondly be- 
cause the French army, in spite of protracted 
preparations, was not ready for the field. The 
outcome of the Algeciras conference was there- 
fore twofold: On the one hand, the integrity 
and independence of Morocco were guaranteed; 
on the other, certain special interests and privi- 
leges in Morocco were conceded to France and 
Spain. To force the French completely out of 



44 Germany's Isolation 

Morocco did not seem possible unless Germany 
were willing to make war for so trivial a reason. 
In fact, nobody had seriously entertained that 
thought. What Germany did gain was satis tac- 
tion for the insult of the diplomatic disregard 
previously explained. Withal it was evident that 
neither with regard to Morocco, nor concerning 
all other points which had led to the Algeciras 
conference, the last word had been spoken. 

Outwardly, to be sure, Germany's prestige, her 
commercial interests in Morocco, and a consid- 
eration for her peculiar position in the eyes of 
the Mohammedan world had to be given a high 
degree of importance as it would have been im- 
prudent to expose to public opinion the danger- 
ous significance of the Morocco question — 
dangerous for the future of Germany and for 
the peace of Europe. To those, more intimately 
acquainted with the intricacies of international 
politics, it was clear that the forcing of the 
Algeciras conference and the partial retreat of 
the French from their actual or potential posi- 
tions in Morocco was only a tentative success. 
The tension of political opposition underlying 
the whole situation was not relieved by the 
temporary victory. 

England's policy regarding the Turkish Orient 
was plainly designed, within a year or two after 
the close of the Russo-Japanese war, to strike 
the decisive blow which she had long since 



The Policy of Isolation 45 

been preparing. To reinforce the intended 
pressure against Germany, she had invented a 
special instrument — the dreadnaught. The basic 
thought which had led to the construction of so 
new and powerful a type of battleship was to 
outclass with all possible speed the naval forces 
of Germany. Hitherto, the heavy armament of 
first rate battleships had consisted of four giant 
guns mounted in revolving turrets; furthermore 
of a greater or smaller artillery of medium caliber 
which, though destructive in its effect, did not 
carry as far as the heaviest cannons. 

The first dreadnaught built by England carried 
no medium artillery at all, but, instead, had in 
place of the customary four, twelve giant guns 
in its revolving turrets. At the same time, the 
new type developed greater speed than the old 
battleships. The purpose of this innovation is 
perfectly clear. The dreadnaught is able, by 
virtue of its superior speed, to carry on a fight 
at a distance that makes an effective operation of 
the hostile medium artillery extremely difficult 
or even impossible. Besides, it operates with 
twelve heavy guns as against four of the 
enemy. The superiority of the dreadnaught was, 
therefore, great enough to render the new type 
practically equivalent to three of the older model 
battleships. The success of the policy of intimi- 
dation, with the help of the dreadnaughts, natu- 
rally depended, in a large measure, upon Eng- 



46 Germany's Isolation 

land's ability to force a speedy issue. Germany 
must either yield or be crushed, before she had 
time to imitate the new type of battleship. If 
Germany did succeed to any extent, the result 
would be a decrease rather than an increase of 
England's superior strength on the sea; for the 
building of dreadnaughts on both sides would re- 
sult in a corresponding depreciation of the old 
types of battleships. In that case, Germany's 
chances to overtake England would be infinitely 
greater than in the event of the previous status 
of England's manifold superiority on the sea. 

All such considerations, even a possible delay 
in deciding the issue, did not seem noticeably to 
disturb England's assurance. Apparently, re- 
sponsible English naval architects and men high 
in authority depended in great measure on Ger- 
many's technical and financial inability to take 
up the building of dreadnaughts. England com- 
mitted an egregious error in thus underrating 
the latent strength of her opponent. At the 
same time, her policy of isolation began to ex- 
hibit serious flaws. The political consequences 
of these miscalculations were soon forthcoming. 



CHAPTER IV 

TENSION AND RECONCILIATION WITH ENGLAND 

Tl US SI A must be regarded as a very important 
-■-^ factor in England's political manipulations. 
Without the express consent of Russia, it was 
impossible to reduce Turkey's power by limiting 
her rule practically to the peninsula of Asia 
Minor. It will be remembered that Russia, dur- 
ing the rapid development of her foreign policy, 
prior to the war with Japan, was not willing to 
agree to any plan in the Orient by which she 
would become a mere tool of England. To force 
Russia into submission, she would have to be 
defeated. This was accomplished with the 
Japanese armies and with English money. Eng- 
land's final move to gain her purpose was to 
make Russia a partner in the Turkish deal. 

How far Russia's ambition extended beyond 
her logical share in the bargain (Armenia and 
the adjoining tracts in Asia Minor) can best be 
inferred from a statement issued from an official 
source in Russia soon after the Russian-English 
treaty, namely, the next few years would witness 
a strengthening of Russia's policy in the direction 
of the Gulf of Iskanderun. In this way Russia 

47 



48 Gerinany's Isolation 

made it plain that, beyond Armenia, the Mediter- 
ranean coast was her objective point. Whether 
or not England's promises to Russia, in the event 
that the Turkish crisis was successfully launched, 
included the Armenia-Iskanderun program, is a 
matter of speculation. In all probability, it did 
not. But whether such was her promise or not 
is a negligible factor in view of one indisputable 
fact : Germany's influence, interests, and railroad 
plans on the other side of the Taurus mountain 
range would have been doomed to abandonment. 

In 1907, every detail of the Anglo-Russian 
agreement was perfect; in another year, the de- 
cisive blow could be dealt. In June, 1908, 
Edward vii and the Czar met at the Russian naval 
station Reval. A month and a half later, the 
meeting of the Czar with the President of the 
French Republic took place. Meanwhile, the 
Young-Turkish revolution had broken out in 
Constantinople, resulting in a temporary shift in 
the conditions of the Orient. It is a well known 
fact today, that in the summer of 1908 all Europe 
not only was in great fear of war, but stood in 
imminent peril of being embroiled in a bloody 
conflict. 

It is no longer a secret that the visit of the 
French president in Russia had been prepared 
for some time past. The sudden changes at 
the Bosporus, a few days prior to the meeting, 
could not have been foreseen by any one. The 



Reconciliation with England 49 

immediate purpose of the two meetings at Reval 
was the launching of a scheme of intervention 
in Macedonia. The Macedonian question had, 
for a number of years, been the most serious 
point in the inner-Turkish policy; at the same 
time, it offered to the foreign powers the best 
possible opportunity for interference. German 
diplomacy was, of course, well informed as to 
the steps planned; nor is it a secret today that 
the German naval forces, as in fact all European 
navies, were at that time in a state of utmost 
preparedness. 

The joint demand of England, Russia, and 
France with regard to Macedonia would in all 
probability have been rejected by the Sultan. 
The Turkish refusal would then have been con- 
sidered sufficient reason for interference. No 
matter what the outcome was, each of the powers, 
party to the agreement, above all, England, was 
to gain effective control over the territory in 
question. For Germany, that would have meant 
the choice between peace and war. Certain it 
seems that King Edward, the governing power 
of the isolation, had set his mark less upon a war 
than upon forcing Germany to submission with- 
out active resistance; in fact, he seemed to be 
all but convinced that at the critical moment the 
ruling authorities in Germany would lack courage 
to declare war. The unexpected revolution in 
Turkey upset the entire program, so that England 



50 Germany's Isolation 

had cause to postpone the forceful issue of the 
crisis in the Orient To explain her willingness 
to wait, it is only necessary to study the con- 
ditions which tended to alienate the Young Turks 
from Germany and caused them to join the trend 
of England's policy. 

The Young Turks, liberals of every shade, be- 
lieved that Germany had been a staunch sup- 
porter of Abdul Hamid's tyrannical system of 
government and that the German influence con- 
stituted a decided danger for the era of liberal- 
ism. That thought was zealously supported by 
the English and French press in Constantinople. 
The Young Turkish liberalism showed in the 
beginning a decided leaning toward a certain 
form of Anglomania. England, the home of 
liberty, of parliaments, of popular government — 
those were the catch phrases promulgated in the 
daily papers. If it were possible to sever the 
political ties between Turkey and Germany and 
to build up a politico-moral protectorate over the 
Young-Turkish government, similar to the tem- 
porary relation of Napoleonic France to Italy, 
the English interest would be served as well as, 
or even better, than by an agreement with France 
and Russia. 

The logical sequence of facts, however, led the 
Young-Turkish committee speedily back to a 
revival of the former relation with Germany. 
Suddenly the crisis seemed to approach from an 



Reconciliation with England 51 

entirely unsuspected quarter. On October 5 
Austria-Hungary proclaimed its sovereignty over 
Bosnia. Although thereby the actual state of 
affairs suffered no change in the least, as Bosnia 
for thirty years had been an Austrian possession 
under Austria's administration, the annexation 
caused an enormous excitement in Servia. For 
the first time since the misfortune of the Japanese 
war, Russia, having assured herself of Italy's 
cooperation, made a hostile move on the Balkans. 
Ever since the failures in Tunis and Abyssinia, 
Italy, in consequence of the king's marriage with 
a princess of Montenegro, had her eye on the 
Balkans, and public opinion in Italy grew increas- 
ingly anxious for the proffered chance to possess 
a strip of land on the other side of the Adriatic 
Sea. That ambition realized, the commercial 
existence of Austria-Hungary would have been 
endangered, as Italian possessions on both sides 
of the Straits of Otranto were likely to imperil 
her outlet upon the open sea. 

On the other hand, Albania proved a par- 
ticularly enticing bait to sever Italy's connection 
with the Triple Alliance and induce her to join 
the English-Russian-French group directed 
against Germany. Russia was particularly active 
in bringing about that conversion. The great 
Slav empire obviously hoped that, during the 
impending settlement of the Turkish question, 
exceptional advantages would be gained by a 



52 Germany's Isolation 

cooperation with Italy. Early in 1909 the whole 
situation was in a highly critical stage. Servia's 
attitude, stirred up and supported by Russia, 
forced Austria-Hungary to a partial though vig- 
orously conducted mobilization. Russia was 
pleased with her own political conduct, which 
was no doubt calculated to express her readiness 
to go to war, and the Russian press, together with 
a number of irresponsible Panslavic organiza- 
tions, continued to add fuel to the fire which was 
threatening to break forth into a great European 
conflagration. 

It had not been England's aim to force the 
crisis by a general European war, which could 
not be avoided if, with Russia's support, the 
threatening conflict between Austria-Hungary 
and Servia were to break out openly. France 
had large financial interests in Turkey and in the 
Balkans, while her navy, owing to the poor qual- 
ity of powder, was in no condition to fight. 
Above all, Russia was unable to take the field. 
Her armed forces had so little recuperated from 
the effects of the war with Japan, and the sub- 
sequent revolution, that she could not enter a 
great European war with any hope for success. 
The entire Russian agitation, encouraging Servia 
and threatening Austria-Hungary and Germany, 
was calculated to intimidate the opponent, but 
was destined to collapse when Germany called the 
bluff. 



Reconciliation with England 53 

On March 20, the German ambassador in St 
Petersburg declared that Germany had decided 
not to influence Austria's independent action with 
regard to the Servian controversy, and if neces- 
sary, to grant her ally every support her life- 
interests seem to demand. Thereupon Russia 
was obliged to put her cards on the table, a move 
equally fatal to Russia's prestige and to the policy 
of the intended isolation of Germany. For now 
it had become a matter of universal knowledge 
that Russia lacked the military strength required 
for the successful pursuance of her political aims. 

A moment of significant consequences for the 
future was the growing conviction, in the political 
circles of Russia, that the government had been 
forced to yield in the Bosnian question by a 
threatening letter of the emperor to the Czar. 
So violently did that supposed pressure on Russia 
act on the public feeling that, since the spring of 
1909, it became a conscious factor in the anti- 
German spirit throughout the empire. In fact, 
as the story of the letter gained increasing cre- 
dence in the cultured strata of Russian society, 
the latent hostility against Germany assumed 
extraordinary proportions. It must not be for- 
gotten that the agreement with England, in 1907, 
meant a return of Russia's policy to its former 
aim, that is, expansion in the direction of the 
Mediterranean. That policy is pursued this very 
day in a determined and energetic manner by 



54 Germany's Isolation 

both the government and Russian public opinion, 
in so far as it is interested in national affairs. 
Evidently, there is only one way to attain that 
end, viz., the political dissolution of the Turkish 
empire. 

That Russia fails to recognize the necessity 
which impels Germany to give Turkey her 
political support is perfectly clear and pardonable. 
As a matter of fact it is difficult for any nation, 
cherishing high hopes and aspirations for her 
own national welfare, to understand Germany's 
policy with regard to the Orient. And yet the 
riddle is not hard to read. The almost passionate 
persistence of the entire Russian nation to gain 
an outlet upon the Mediterranean Sea touches 
the very core of Germany's interest in the con- 
tinued existence of Asiatic Turkey as an inde- 
pendent power. To understand that one fact in 
all its bearings upon Germany's economic future 
is to appreciate the political situation involved. 

The Turkish empire, surrounded as it is by 
covetous neighbors, most naturally looks for pro- 
tection to a power that has preferably no terri- 
torial interests in the Orient. That requirement 
is fulfilled by Germany, which, in turn, would 
suffer considerably if Turkey were to be wiped 
out. It is plain that if Russia and England are 
to become the principal heirs of Turkey, their 
territorial and political power would thereby be 
greatly increased. But even in the event that a 



Reconciliation with England 55 

goodly share of Turkey would fall to Germany, 
that country would experience troubles without 
end; for Russia, and, in a certain sense, France 
and Italy are neighbors of Turkey with her pres- 
ent boundaries, and as such are in the position 
to occupy and defend their respective shares, on 
land and sea. Germany, on the other hand, has 
no direct communication with the Orient. The 
land route leads not only through Austria- 
Hungary, but also through Roumania and Bul- 
garia, and in order to reach the coast of Asia 
Minor and Syria by water it would be necessary 
to round almost all of Europe by way of the 
English Channel, the Straits of Gibraltar, and the 
French-English Mediterranean routes. 

Today it would indeed be a heavy burden for 
Germany to retain any territory in the Orient, 
over which she had an immediate control. A 
German Asia Minor or Mesopotamia is con- 
ceivable only if at least Russia and her ally 
France be compelled to renounce their aims and 
ideals; or, in other words, if the outcome of a 
world war favor the interests of Germany. Obvi- 
ously, the present German policy cannot seriously 
entertain a prospect of such far-reaching conse- 
quences. Contrary to the standpoint occupied 
by responsible German circles, Russian public 
opinion clamors loudly for the forcible pursuance 
of an aim which intrinsically agrees with the 
policy of the government. The consequences of 



56 Germany's Isolation 

Germany's estimate of the political situation, self- 
evident as they are, will form the contents of 
another chapter. 

The Young-Turkish revolution and Russia's 
military impotence, which came to light a year 
later as the consequence of her defeat at the hands 
of Japan, resulted, at least for the time being, in 
a failure of England's policy of isolation as orig- 
inally conceived. Britain's policy, it will be re- 
membered, aimed at Germany's immediate or 
gradual surrender, in fact or in spirit, to the 
extensive English program in the Orient, by 
means of dreadnaughts and an alliance with 
Russia and France. If the English plan had been 
successful, Germany's defeat would have been 
overwhelming. Even Prussia's retreat to 
Olmiitz, which may have been considered its 
closest parallel, presents superior features, as in 
the present case it would have been impossible to 
recover from the crushing blow. 

It seemed as if the death of Edward vii in 
May, the year following, was an accidental or 
even predestined occurrence, confirming, as it 
were, the failure of a policy so zealously pursued 
by that ruler since the beginning of his reign. 
Though Edward's death did not alter the funda- 
mental relation of the powers, particularly that 
between Great Britain and Germany, yet the 
English policy lost a characteristic which was 
highly effective though scarcely discernible. 



Reconciliation with England 57 

namely, the deliberate and active participation of 
a master mind in shaping a political situation 
hostile to the interests of the German empire. 

Another factor of considerable moment for 
strengthening Germany's power henceforth 
gained prominence. The effects of England's 
dreadnaught policy made themselves felt. Until 
this policy had become effective, England had 
unquestionably the manifold naval ascendency 
over Germany. Only by extraordinary efforts 
could Germany hope to raise her fleet numerically 
to the level of the English navy. On the part 
of England, such efforts might result either in a 
corresponding increase of the English navy or 
in England's decision to force a clash while she 
was still certain of her superior strength. If, on 
the other hand, Germany decided to follow Eng- 
land's example in building dreadnaughts, the 
disparity of the two navies would, from the very 
beginning, be considerably smaller than before. 
At the same time, the ships of the older type 
would depreciate equally on both sides, obviously 
to the disadvantage of England's fighting power. 

Now, England argued that even if the Oriental 
crisis were deferred, the Germans would not be 
in the position offhand to adopt the new type of 
battleship; and that, furthermore, they would 
grudge the expenses connected with the building 
of dreadnaughts, expenses amounting to double 
the cost of an older type line-of -battle ship. As 



58 Germany's Isolation 

a matter of fact, the Kaiser Wilhelm Canal had 
to be rebuilt to meet the needs of the new battle- 
ships ; an enterprise which, in addition to the ex- 
tensive alterations in the various German naval 
ports, entailed the expenditure of millions of 
dollars. The comprehensive view demanded by 
the circumstances and the readiness to make great 
financial sacrifices are two virtues which the 
British believed sorely lacking in the German 
nation, a mis judgment of the actual state of 
affairs shared alike by the rank and file of the 
nation as well as by the highest government 
officials. 

In this connection, two other factors contribut- 
ing to England's political fiasco deserve mention. 
It had been impossible for England to foresee 
the Young-Turkish revolution and the subsequent 
failure to win Young Turkey over to the English 
side, promising as that move appeared at the 
start. In addition, Russia's total defeat in the 
war with Japan, the annihilation of her fleet, and 
the revolution, which for a time threatened to 
disintegrate her civil and military organizations, 
all tended completely to upset the program which 
England had carefully worked out. The Japan- 
ese medicine which England had prescribed for 
Russia was successful, though it all but killed 
the patient. 

If nothing but the relative strength of the two 
navies had been the decisive factor, England 



Reconciliation with England 59 

could barely have found a time more opportune 
to attack her opponent successfully than the early 
stage of the new naval era, for already a number 
of English dreadnaughts were afloat, when Ger- 
many had not yet launched her first battleship 
of the new type. And yet it seems plain why 
England, weighing the pros and cons, did not 
venture the attack. We need but think of 
Russia's military plight which would prevent her 
and her ally France from giving England the in- 
dispensable assistance. It is indeed a risky enter- 
prise for any nation to plunge into a world war 
on the theory that by deferring the encounter, a 
favorable opportunity to conquer the opponent 
may be lost. In spite of all, there remains the 
one indisputable fact that England, by her failure 
to launch out, had herself called into question her 
absolute supremacy on the sea which had been 
one of the basic factors of her long cherished 
plan of isolating Germany. ^— 

Two years later, when the Morocco question 
for the second time entered into a dangerously 
acute stage, the condition of the German navy, 
with reference to the construction of dread- 
naughts and minor war accessories, gained con- 
siderable prominence. It will be remembered 
that in the Algeciras conference France had con- 
ceded under pressure to recognize the independ- 
ence and territorial integrity of Morocco. Never- 
theless she was able, by means of dexterous 



do Germany's Isolation ^ 

shifts, to gain advantages which did not exactly 
violate the terms of the Morocco agreement. For 
a time the French carefully avoided any overt 
acts of sufficient importance to call forth em- 
phatic protests on the part of Germany. Sud- 
denly the French government decided to termi- 
nate that rather prudent policy by a somewhat 
impatient and overhasty act — an advance of a 
whole army on the capital of Morocco. This 
unexpected move was so clearly a violation of 
the Algeciras agreement that Germany forthwith 
decided to register an energetic protest, which 
she effected by sending the small cruiser Panther 
to Agadir, a harbor in South Morocco. 

Germany's warlike procedure seemed, strangely 
enough, a cause for renewed and increasingly 
bitter attacks on the foreign policy of the Ger- 
man government, which from the start had been 
criticized for its attitude in the Morocco affairs 
by a part of the German press. Now, public 
opinion was certainly not justified in its criticism 
of the government if the entire Morocco affair 
had been viewed, as it should have been, in the 
light of the English-French entente and the 
political aims of England in the Orient. 

It is always necessary to keep in mind Eng- 
land's ambition to take possession of Arabia and 
the land bordering the Euphrates as a protective 
territory, which would render the English posi- 
tions in Egypt immune from aggression. To 



Reconciliation with England 61 

secure the consent of France, she had willingly 
given up what claims she had for the acquisition 
of Morocco. If now Germany meant to assert 
her rights and interests on a larger scope in 
Morocco, that country was practically sure to 
encounter the joint opposition of England and 
France. Morocco had been ceded to France in 
the nature of a present which would- certainly 
fall short of its purpose if England could not 
guarantee to France the incontestable title to the 
much coveted prize. 

Such were the facts at the bottom of the entire 
transaction, in view of which it was plainly no 
mean success for the German policy to force a 
renewed discussion of the French-English Mo- 
rocco business post factum before an international 
conference, and thereby to limit the far-reaching 
plans of the French republic. 

Another fact which the critics of Germany's 
foreign policy failed to take into account was 
the unprepared state of the navy, without which 
Germany could not let matters come to the point 
of breaking, except in case of utmost emergency. 
Germany's opponents were, of course, well aware 
of these shortcomings. Notably the so-called 
Bangerman faction accused the government of 
weakness in its attitude toward the Morocco 
crisis of 191 1. Obviously it was not known to 
the critics that at the time of the Panther's visit 
to Agadir, the rebuilding of the Kaiser Wilhelm 



62 Germany's Isolation 

Canal was only half completed, that the enlarge- 
ment of Helgoland into a strong sea fort was still 
far from finished, and that the numerical strength 
of the navy, particularly with reference to the 
dreadnaughts and auxiliary implements, com- 
pared at that time far more unfavorably with the 
English naval forces than it did three years later. 

To provoke a war under such unfavorable con- 
ditions would indeed have been foolish, doubly 
so in the face of certain knowledge that the 
chances for success would be vastly better in the 
future. If Germany had insisted upon the acqui- 
sition of South Morocco, France and England 
would have been forced into the conflict. The 
French would tolerate the Germans as their neigh- 
bors in Morocco only after a defeat, for what 
would prevent the Germans, once in Morocco, 
from supplying the natives, the Algerians, the 
Senegalese, and other French subjects, with 
arms, money, and military leaders ? What would 
prevent them, indeed, at the first favorable oppor- 
tunity from instigating a rebellion or even break- 
ing up the French colonial empire in North 
Africa? Every rational foreign policy aims to 
ascertain the life interests of its adversary, and 
ventures an attack only with a view of forcing 
the opponent into conditions which it desires for 
the benefit of its own propagation. 

When, in 191 1, a French army marched into 
the interior of Morocco and occupied the capital, 



Reconciliation with England 63 

Germany, if it was at all ready to take official 
notice of that move, could not hesitate any longer 
to point out the flagrant violation of the Algeciras 
treaty. In doing so, she had to consider, and as 
a matter of fact did consider, that France was 
in the position to react in two different ways on 
Germany's move of diplomacy. She might 
threaten, "Hands off Morocco, or we shall fight 
you;" or she might ask, " What will you take for 
giving up your claims on Morocco ? " Germany's 
bold venture at Agadir was the result of her 
acquaintance with Russia's lack of military pre- 
paredness. It was no secret in the inner political 
circles that the war with Japan had wrought 
havoc upon the Russian army, and that the re- 
organization had not progressed sufficiently to 
warrant active participation in an Anglo-French 
war against Germany. Without the knowledge 
of Russia's plight, the Agadir experiment would 
indeed have been a case of political recklessness 
of the most dangerous sort. 

As a last resort and with the utmost reluctance 
France finally agreed to indemnify Germany for 
renouncing her political claims in Morocco. It 
is a well-known fact today that in the course of 
the proceedings, she continually attempted to 
bring about English interference in order to force 
Germany either to retreat or to declare war. At 
times, her influence seemed all but successful. 
Misleading statements alleging Germany's anti- 



64 Germany's Isolation 

French, and notably anti-English intentions in 
Morocco stirred up public opinion in England to 
a high pitch of hostile expression, and more than 
once created an acutely dangerous attitude of the 
English policy. The French made especial use 
of the delusive allegation that the Germans 
planned to construct a naval station in Morocco 
with a view of cutting off England's wheat sup- 
ply by intercepting the Argentine grain ships, 
which every spring come within close range of 
the coast of Morocco. 

The strenuous and successful efforts of France 
to incite English public opinion against Germany 
did not become fully known until some time 
after. Certain it is that France would have to 
shoulder the responsibility if matters at that time 
had taken a warlike turn. Yet every effort to 
induce England to make war on Germany, if 
necessary without the assistance of Russia, 
proved absolutely futile. What the French policy 
did show, without the shadow of a doubt, was 
the unwillingness to cede to Germany the terri- 
tory of New-Kamerun as an indemnity for 
acknowledging the sovereignty of France in 
Morocco. 

In the course of negotiations between England 
and France, the question of England's military 
assistance on land was being discussed at some 
length. England, so it seemed, was asked by 
France to send an expeditionary force of one 



Reconciliation with England Q5 

hundred and fifty thousand soldiers, not by the 
short route, Dover-Calais, which could have 
easily been protected, but by way of the North 
Sea. It was argued that by way of Calais the 
English would have had to use the railroads re- 
served for the transport of the French troops, an 
arrangement which would have either resulted in 
disorder of the French muster or prevented the 
English from arriving at the battle front in time 
for action. On the other hand, England's assist- 
ance might prove exceedingly helpful and effect- 
ive if the English forces marched through neutral 
Belgium and interfered with the muster of Ger- 
man troops in the lov^^er Rhine valley. The 
second plan would have been a real danger for 
Germany, a greater danger, indeed, than even 
the landing of troops in Schleswig-Holstein, a 
project made famous by Bismarck's terse witti- 
cism. Bismarck, it seems, had been asked what 
he would do if one hundred thousand English- 
men appeared in Schleswig-Holstein, to which 
the Iron Chancellor replied that he would have 
them arrested. 

But England balked. The distance between the 
English coast and the mouth of the Scheldt was 
too great. In spite of the vast numerical superi- 
ority in battleships it was manifestly not safe to 
undertake a transport of so large a body of 
troops. There were German submarines, and the 
German torpedo boats were known to be in a high 



66 Germany's Isolation 

state of efficiency. These and perhaps still other 
reasons, not to forget Russia's unpreparedness, 
constituted sufficient grounds for England's fail- 
ure to act. One other fact not hitherto mentioned 
may have lent its weight to preserve peace; 
Edward vii was no longer among the living. The 
royal office, its constitutional limitations notwith- 
standing, no longer lent its weighty judgment to 
the belief that in the critical moment the German 
emperor would decide in favor of peace, a con- 
viction which under Edward vii had been the 
very foundation of England's foreign policy. 

At the conclusion of the Morocco negotiations, 
the French waived their hitherto uncontested 
right to the Belgian Congo and ceded to Ger- 
many a piece of their equatorial possession which, 
when united with Kamerun, extended the German 
frontiers in two directions as far as the Belgium 
territory. The form in which this transaction 
was clothed was somewhat indistinct but good 
enough for practical purposes. In the light of 
the results obtained, the numerous attacks on the 
German Morocco-Congo policy, so-called, by Ger- 
man critics were obviously unjustified and unjust. 
It must be remembered that to gain South Mo- 
rocco in 191 1 would have been impossible, ex- 
cept, perhaps, as the result of a successful war. 
Even when Germany declared herself ready to 
waive all political claims on Morocco in considera- 
tion of an indemnity in tropical Africa, war was 



Reconciliation with England 67 

avoided only by the breadth of a hair. The very 
thought of a German South Morocco was im- 
possible for France and unbearable for suspicious 
England. The practical occupation of the coun- 
try would have placed Germany from the very 
beginning before the alternative of war or retreat. 

No matter what is said and done regarding 
Morocco, if France, with or without her allies, 
forces war upon Germany, Morocco will consti- 
tute part of the spoils. Yet, in 191 1 to have 
plunged Germany into war on account of Morocco 
would have been a foolish if not criminal act on 
the part of the government. First of all, Ger- 
many lacked the consciousness of a moral right, 
that is to say, the conviction that her national 
existence was at stake; that certainty only can 
justify a decision in favor of such far-reaching 
consequence. In the second place, it would have 
been abject folly to declare war in the face of 
inadequate military preparedness. Lastly, if 
Morocco is ever to be a casus belli, it will mean- 
while constantly grow in value as the result of 
French colonizing efforts. 

The above considerations show clearly that it 
is wrong to interpret the Morocco-Congo ex- 
change in terms of the possible colonial value of 
the newly acquired territory of New-Kamerun. 
I visited the country and am in the position to 
state that in spite of the ill-reputed swamps and 
the sleeping sickness it is not nearly as bad as 



68 Germany's Isolation 

proclaimed by people that know nothing about it. 
The swamps interfere neither with the accessi- 
bility of the land nor with any chance of turning 
it to the best advantage ; the sleeping sickness can 
be combated, and large tracts of land ceded by 
France are capable of profitable development 
when opened up by railroads, without which the 
interior of Africa is without any value. But all 
this is of minor importance. One fact and that 
only is of momentous significance — the fact that 
the French were forced to renounce their rights 
which they assumed in the Berlin-Congo confer- 
ence and according to which they claimed the ex- 
clusive option on the colonial territory of Belgium 
if that country should ever be willing to dispose 
of its possessions. Besides, Germany had now 
become the western neighbor of a district where 
the danger of English competition seems out of 
the question. 

With regard to the Congo, there need be no 
fear that Germany plans to annex that territory 
either openly or by underhand means. The 
Congo is Belgium's property, and every spurious 
assertion that Germany has designs upon it 
emanates from the mouth of a calumniator or a 
wanton prattler. Whether or not Belgium will 
be able to retain the Congo in the face of enor- 
mous financial sacrifices is, of course, an entirely 
different question. During the reign of King 
Leopold of Belgium, the resources of that equa- 



Reconciliation with England 60 

torial region have been drained to the last penny, 
and the ever increasing deficit incurred causes a 
correspondingly growing concern to the govern- 
ment. Moreover, since the date of the original 
treaty by which King Leopold was given posses- 
sion of the Congo, the Belgian nation has voiced 
strenuous objections against the oppressing colo- 
nial burden. So strong has been the feeling of 
opposition to the colonial venture that public 
demands were made to dispose of part of the 
African possessions, a symptom which certainly 
needs no further interpretation. 

Now, let it be supposed that Germany had at 
no time before taken an interest in the Congo, 
and the question of a sale were assuming a 
definite form, France would most certainly put 
forth her claims as a customer, of course, not 
without having previously secured England's 
consent. What would be the result? Criticisms 
without number that the German government 
failed to recognize the importance of the Belgian 
offer and allowed a splendid chance for colonial 
aggrandizement to pass by unnoticed. What has 
been said of the Congo is equally true of Angola, 
which belongs to Portugal. Angola, it should be 
remembered, touches South West Africa on one 
side and the Congo south and west on the other 
side. Here again it may be asked, "How long 
will Portugal be able or willing to keep Angola ? " 

The Morocco conflict, during which England 



70 Germany s Isolation 

had played the part of a second to France, marks 
the climax in a German-English tension of ten 
years' standing. Now, although it is apparent 
that England's extensive preparation to force a 
political crisis was aimed at the Germans, , and 
her foreign policy at a complete isolation of Ger- 
many, it is nevertheless true that the extreme 
danger of war during the Morocco conflict was 
due to quite a different cause: England plainly 
mistrusted Germany's Morocco policy. Some 
time after normal conditions had been restored, 
a member of the English cabinet made the follow- 
ing statement, "If the German government had 
made it plain from the very beginning that Ger- 
many had no intentions of doing violence to 
France or of remaining in Morocco, the danger 
of the whole situation, temporary as it proved to 
be, could have been prevented." As a matter of 
fact, Germany made her wishes very plain, but 
when she did, England mistrusted her. Not until 
some time later did England allay her suspicions 
and establish a policy of confidence toward Ger- 
many. 

A survey of the political situation which de- 
veloped since the second Morocco conference and 
after the anti-English debates in the German 
Reichstag of 191 1, reveals a rather sudden revul- 
sion of feelings in England. This change, which 
seems all the more remarkable if it be remem- 
bered that the English had all but begun hostili- 



Reconciliation with England 71 

ties, is due to a number of widely different causes. 
The first of these is of a particularly striking 
nature. Strange as it may seem, the English 
opinions of the former chancellor Prince Biilow 
and the present chancellor von Bethmann-Holl- 
weg are greatly at variance. Certain quarters 
mistrusted von Biilow's policy, charging errone- 
ously that he worked to further Germany's inter- 
ests at the expense of England. With the present 
chancellor the case is quite different, England 
having slowly arrived at the conclusion that von 
Bethmann-Hollweg's policy has a high regard for 
the life-interest of England, a regard which Ger- 
many would fain have reciprocated. Curiously 
enough, a new imperial chancellor was needed 
to teach England a fact which every thinking 
person versed in affairs of the state regards as 
axiomatic. England's case verifies the truism so 
frequently forgotten or neglected that our op- 
ponents govern their actions not so much by our 
real thoughts and intentions as by their faulty 
interpretations of them. 

Another cause for England's change of atti- 
tude resulted from the introduction of the new 
dreadnaught type which, as intimated, reduced 
England's naval superiority in no small degree. 
When in the critical moment the political com- 
binations, in support of which the new type of 
battleship had been constructed, refused to work, 
the dreadnaughts were no longer an advantage 



72 Germany's Isolation 

to the English fighting strength. On the con- 
trary, the successful adoption of the new type 
by Germany and other countries tended to dimin- 
ish the disparity of strength between the English 
navy and that of the rest of the great naval 
powers. This is particularly true in the case of 
Germany where the building of dreadnaughts 
progressed faster and better than in other coun- 
tries. The proportion of Germany's large line- 
of -battle ships to those of England is today repre- 
sented by the ratio ten to sixteen, a condition 
which would be out of question without the 
dreadnaughts. In a certain sense, therefore, Eng- 
land's first mistake, the cession of Helgoland to 
Germany, was followed, fifteen years later, by 
another blunder, the building of dreadnaughts. 

A third factor doubtless responsible for the 
revulsion of feeling in England has its roots in 
the industrial insurance laws. In that form of 
social amelioration Germany led the nations of 
the earth. There was, of course, no dearth of 
criticisms which busily pointed out that the in- 
surance laws constituted a grave obstacle to Ger- 
many's successful competition with other manu- 
facturing nations. Yet, in the course of time, 
the moral pressure of Germany's example proved 
so strong that an industrial nation like the English 
could scarcely expect successfully to resist an 
early adoption of the industrial insurance law. 
The new venture, naturally, entailed a great ex- 



Reconciliation with England 78 

penditure of funds, which had to be drawn from 
the public treasury. At the same time the public 
burdens, levied by the constant increase of the 
navy, assumed such enormous proportions that 
the question was raised, " Which seems the more 
prudent course, a perpetual readiness to attack 
Germany, or a peaceful understanding with that 
country?" 

In addition to the reasons cited, the conviction 
was rather suddenly forced on England that, con- 
trary to the general belief, the German people 
were fully able to meet the financial demands of 
a war. Anent this contingency not only the Eng- 
lish but also the French and even the Germans 
themselves entertained entirely erroneous views. 
It was a matter of general surprise that during 
the Morocco crisis as well as during the two 
Balkan wars Germany's financial stability was 
practically unaffected while all the rest of Europe 
suffered to no inconsiderable degree. At the 
same time, a number of publications exhibited 
to the entire world the splendid growth of Ger- 
many's national wealth within the last twenty 
years. The most important among the works of 
that type is a book by Dr. Karl Helff erich ( Presi- 
dent of the Deutsche Bank), entitled Germany's 
National Wealth, 1888- 19 13. There seems to be 
no longer any doubt that Germany's total wealth 
exceeds that of either England or France, and 
that the per capita rate is but slightly exceeded, if 



74 Germany's Isolation 

at all, by the English or French figures. Eng- 
land's supposed ascendency over Germany thereby 
lost one of its mainstays on which the anti- 
German policy had largely depended. 

A last, though perhaps not decisive, reason 
for England's conciliatory attitude may be found 
in Germany's progress along a certain line of 
applied military science. I am referring to her 
superior aerial fleet, superior by England's own 
confession. It is generally admitted that in a 
war on land or on sea victory is almost always 
on that side which is able to obtain the more 
rapid information as to strength and position of 
the opponent. In other words, as long as the 
Germans have more or better airships than the 
English, they possess a more efficient intelligence 
service before the beginning of a naval battle. 
A belligerent, though generally inferior to his 
opponent, is nevertheless able to carry off the vic- 
tory if he shows superior tactics in attacking one 
unit of the hostile forces after the other. To 
that end, successful and detailed information in 
regard to the enemy and a careful disguise of his 
own movements are of the utmost importance. 
It is not impossible, in case of war with England, 
that Germany solely through the help of her 
large rigid airships will gain a naval victory in 
the North Sea, a victory which may prove more 
weakening to the English forces than to the 
German. It does not seem likely that England 



Beconciliation with England 75 

will jeopardize her chances of success in the face 
of such a possibility. 

The facts enumerated in the foregoing para- 
graphs did not constitute the only reasons for 
the change in England's foreign policy in its 
relation to Germany. Other questions touching 
intimately upon British interests did their share 
of the work. Among these, the march of events 
in the Balkan peninsula and in the Turkish Orient 
take foremost rank. To arrive at a correct esti- 
mate of the situation, it is necessary to start with 
Russia as a point of departure. The affairs of 
Russia, however, demand extensive and thorough- 
going considerations, which must be viewed in 
their entirety and are therefore reserved for 
another chapter. And yet it does not seem pre- 
mature to note the result of the previously named 
motives for the change in England's attitude 
toward Germany, the result that a mutual under- 
standing between the two countries rests unques- 
tionably upon a number of necessary presupposi- 
tions, which demand sacrifices and concessions 
from both of the contending parties. 

In arriving at the conclusion stated above, one 
important consideration must not be withheld. 
England, unlike Germany, is not interested in the 
lasting conservation of the Turkish empire. On 
the contrary, she aims at the speedy annexation 
of the territory between Palestine and the mouth 
of the Tigris to her Egyptian possession, and the 



76 Germany's Isolation 

establishment of a great Anglo- Arabian caliphate. 
No doubt England has been cherishing that plan 
as a pet policy, though she has tentatively aban- 
doned it in view of prevailing German interests. 
Yet there is a vast difference between Russia's 
desire to dismember the Turkish empire from the 
north, and England's Anglo- Arabian project. 
The Egyptian question loses its significance for 
England as soon as Germany makes sure of her 
own desire for a lasting peace which, in turn, 
would be possible only if her commercial ex- 
pansion suffered no irreparable injuries. As 
soon as the English began to recognize Germany's 
pacific intentions, all obstacles for a permanent 
understanding seemed to be removed. Until then, 
there had always been a strong suspicion in Eng- 
land that the German navy was planned, in last 
analysis, to serve the purpose of attack. That 
wholly unfounded mistrust on the part of an en- 
tire nation can be explained only on psychological 
grounds. Heretofore, England as a nation was 
unable to place herself in the position of a people 
which, like the Germans, had experienced a vast 
expansion of their foreign commercial interests 
which it was anxious to protect with a navy of 
sufficient strength. "Why [so the English 
argued] does Germany need a navy? Is not one 
all powerful navy, the English navy, more 
than able to protect the freedom of the seas? 
Now, if Germany persists in building ship after 



Eeconciliatio7i with England 77 

ship she has obviously no other end in view than 
an attack on England.'* So, England continued 
to sing Winston Churchill's tune of the German 
"de luxe" navy. Not until lately did it dawn 
upon Britain that Germany, by increasing her 
navy, was but following the inevitable law of 
economic growth, by which all great nations are 
forced to safeguard their foreign interests, with- 
out presuming too much upon the good will of 
other governments. 

From the foregoing it is clear that England 
agreed to respect the integrity of Turkey, pending 
the eventual fulfillment of her wishes with regard 
to Arabia and the territories adjacent to the 
Euphrates and the Egyptian border. It will be 
an affair of German diplomacy to defer the point 
of time when the English proviso will gain a 
dangerously practical significance. In doing so, 
it seems reasonably certain that England prefers, 
on general principle, to set aside her own wishes 
if she succeeds thereby in curbing Russia's am- 
bition of extending her domain to the Mediter- 
ranean coast. There can be no doubt that the 
English policy has voluntarily given some of the 
essential pledges of honesty and good will toward 
Germany, as may be imagined, not without losing 
sight of England's political aspirations previously 
pointed out. The political situation had indeed 
changed. During the reign of Edward vii the 
policy of German isolation had been pursued with 



78 Germany's Isolation 

great vigor; as late as 191 1, a war-pact had been 
the object of serious discussion between the Eng- 
lish and French governments; and now England 
no longer objects to the building of the Bagdad 
railroad, a project which she had heretofore so 
strenuously opposed. The Bagdad railroad is 
being built, and is being built with German 
capital. 

For a time the Germans had ceded to England 
the rights of constructing the section from Bag- 
dad to the Gulf of Persia in exchange for the 
right of way through Syria to Alexandretta, the 
best harbor in that region of the Mediterranean. 
Lately, England relinquished the supervision also 
of the previously ceded section from Bagdad to 
the Gulf in favor of Germany. The result of 
this double shift is that the railroad terminal will 
not be located at Koweit, a small seaport within 
English jurisdiction, but in Bassora at the mouth 
of the Euphrates and Tigris, a vilayet incon- 
testably under Turkish rule. The construction 
work in the harbor of Bassora and the labor re- 
quired to make the last one hundred and twenty 
miles of the united Euphrates and Tigris (the 
so-called Shat-el-Arab), navigable are financed by 
a company with more German than English 
capital. North of the thirty-first latitude (about 
the latitude of Austin, Texas) no tracks have 
been laid with English money, nor English rail- 
way concessions been asked or granted. 



Reconciliation with England 79 

The Russian and French negotiations with 
Turkey regarding railway concessions in the 
northeast of Asia Minor and in Syria, have re- 
sulted neither in an intersection nor in a menacing 
restriction of Germany's economic interests along 
the Bagdad road. The concessions obtained by 
France are of less practical value than French 
public opinion seems to assume, and than the 
official publications in the French press endeavor 
to make known. The Russian- French concessions 
between the Armenian Taurus and the Black Sea 
are in part, at least for the present, consigned to 
the draftsman's board, owing to serious topo- 
graphic obstacles. Besides, provisions have been 
made, by way of good connections with the Bag- 
dad railroad, to facilitate Turkey's military prepa- 
rations in the event of war. That feature of the 
enterprise is of great importance. In the face 
of this situation both France and Russia can ill 
afford to sacrifice their prestige or trifle with 
public opinion. They must create the impression 
of success even if the facts in the case do not 
warrant that course. Not so Germany; her 
policy, unencumbered by the weighty considera- 
tions of her rivals, is prone to follow the very 
opposite path. 

Another basic factor of the German-English 
entente deserves mention. Germany is now able 
to turn every fair and promising chance of ex- 
panding her interests in Africa to the best ad- 



80 Germany's Isolation 

vantage without incurring England's protest. 
Such contingencies may arise if Belgium and 
Portugal are unable, as previously pointed out, 
to develop the resources of their West- African 
possessions and are willing to enter into agree- 
ments which will prove politically and financially 
of distinct benefit to them. But even though the 
powers concerned had in the past been willing to 
dispose of their territory, Germany's control of 
it would have been out of the question as long 
as England objected. From all appearance, these 
obstacles have now been removed. The attentive 
observer is nevertheless justified in assuming a 
certain attitude of mistrust toward England, in 
counselling unrelenting vigilance, and in leaning 
toward a critical analysis of the English conces- 
sions with a view of determining their value and 
their sincerity. Above all, there is lack of proof 
that in the event of a German-Russian war, Eng- 
land has no secret understanding with Russia 
directed against the security of the German em- 
pire. On the other hand, it does not pay to be 
blind to actual advantages gained, and to measure 
them lastingly in terms of the unattainable. 



CHAPTER V 

THE RUSSIAN PERIL 

XTO estimate of general European political 
-*- ^ activity can possibly be correct or even 
complete if it fails to take cognizance of Russia's 
renewed ambition to gain a foothold on the 
eastern coast of the Mediterranean, a policy 
which she energetically resumed after the treaty 
with Japan in 1905. Russia's objective point is 
either the Dardanelles or the southern coast of 
Asia Minor. After the Anglo-Russian treaty in 
1907, a person of high rank said that henceforth 
a permanent Russian action in the direction of the 
Gulf of Iskanderun may be expected. 

This statement which has previously been 
quoted in a different connection is equally ap- 
plicable to present-day conditions. Russia's 
action, however, received a strong check in con- 
sequence of the war with Japan, which seriously 
impaired the efficiency of her army. Similarly 
the internal upheavals of 1905 interfered in no 
small degree with the execution of her political 
program as above outlined. Even as late as 
1908 and 1909, that is, after the Anglo-Russian 
and Franco-Russian meetings at Reval, and later 
during the Servo-Bosnian crisis, Russia was not 

81 



82 Germany's Isolation 

yet in the position to back her demands with her 
armed forces, and was subsequently compelled 
to withdraw her demands when she saw that 
Germany was determined to support Austria- 
Hungary. 

As soon as Russia had made sure that her plans 
in the Orient would be crossed by the joint action 
of Germany and Austria-Hungary, she at once 
set to work to remove the obstacle. Her efforts 
in that direction date back to the time of the 
Russian- Japanese treaty of peace (summer of 
1905 at Portsmouth, N. H.), and Austria's an- 
nexation of Bosnia, w^hen she attempted to loosen 
the ties of the Triple Alliance by means of cer- 
tain promises to Italy. If it were possible — -so 
she argued — to instigate dissension between 
Austria-Hungary and Italy, Russia's chances in 
a war with Austria would be greatly enhanced. 
Moreover, it was then possible for Russia to 
reach her goal at the Mediterranean without a 
struggle for life or death. It will be recalled that 
in 1909 a clash of Austrian and Italian interests 
in the western part of the Balkan peninsula was 
imminent. At that time, and immediately pre- 
ceding, Russia's intimacy with Italy had pass- 
ingly entered upon a very dangerous stage. 

When in 1909 it had become evident that 
Russia's policy had failed, she forthwith launched 
a new project, viz., the unification of the little 
Balkan states, a coup by which she hoped to tie up 



The Russian Peril 83 

Austria's military forces. It has become known 
since then that the alliance of Bulgaria, Servia, 
Montenegro, and Greece was originally not 
directed against Turkey but against Austria- 
Hungary, and, what is more, that Russia had 
been sponsor to the union. That the storm first 
broke over Turkey is an extraneous matter; in 
the end Russia had no objections against that 
turn of events, provided that the Balkan alliance 
proved lasting, that she retained her place as its 
patron and that, even after it had increased at 
Turkey's expense, it could be used as an effective 
weapon against Austria. 

In the beginning, all prospects for success 
seemed bright. Quite unexpectedly, however, 
Russia's hopes came to naught when, immediately 
after the victory over Turkey, a war broke out 
among the allies as the result of Bulgaria's ex- 
cessive demands. Henceforth an irreparable 
breach seemed to separate the Slavic nations of 
the Balkan peninsula. Russia did all in her 
power to prevent the subsequent internal war in 
the Balkans, but her efforts proved in vain. By 
this change of events the general Balkan con- 
federation against Austria lost its significance for 
some time to come. 

As a substitute Russia now employed every 
known artifice to win Roumania to her side. In 
a war against Austria, Servia's assistance was 
reasonably assured, and if Roumania, too, could 



84 Germany's Isolation 

be won to the cause, Russia would attain prac- 
tically the same end that had prompted her to 
call the Balkan alliance into existence, viz., to tie 
up an important unit of the Austro-IIungarian 
army in the south. Roumania, no doubt, would 
make large political demands, nothing less, per- 
haps, than the cession of the greater part of Bes- 
sarabia, a country with over a million of Rou- 
manian inhabitants. Until 1878 that tract of land 
had belonged to Roumania. At the Congress 
of Berlin, however, Russia forced Roumania to 
cede Bessarabia in exchange for the valueless 
province of Dobrudja — presumably in recogni- 
tion of Roumania's invaluable assistance in the 
war against Turkey. 

Russia's territorial ambition to gain the Med- 
iterranean was exposed in all its rudeness when, 
in January, 1913, she attempted to send an army 
into Turkish Armenia, hoping thereby to force 
the terms of peace of the allied Balkans upon the 
Sultan. As a matter of fact Russia cared far 
less for Turkey's submission than for the long 
coveted opportunity to obtain a foothold in 
Asiatic Turkey. Now, if the occupation by 
Russia of the Armenian territory had been car- 
ried out, the disintegration of the Turkish empire 
would have been merely a question of time. It 
was for that particular reason that Germany 
protested against Russia's impending action. 
Armenia's geographical location and physical 



The Russian Peril 85 

contours are of such a character that Turkey's 
political and military existence is at an end if she 
loses Armenia, and irretrievably at an end if she 
loses it to Russia. 

Armenia gives to its owner an immediate and 
absolute control of eastern Asia Minor and upper 
Mesopotamia. The country is plainly a thor- 
oughfare, being crossed from east to west by 
two large natural highways. The more northern 
roads lead from Persia across the Iranian- 
Armenian frontier mountains over Bayazid and 
Karakilissa to Erzerum, a fortified town and the 
key to Asia Minor ; thence through the valley of 
the western Euphrates to Erzingan, a town in 
Asiatic Turkey. Erzingan is the practical ap- 
proach to the Anatolian highlands. The second 
road leads from the basin of Lake Van, which 
communicates by a number of passes with the 
Iranian highlands, through the valley of the 
eastern Euphrates over Mush-Palu to Charput 
and Malatia. The two last named towns control 
the approach to central and southern Anatolia 
as Erzerum and Erzingan control the northern 
entrance. Still more dominating is the location 
of Armenia in the south toward Mesopotamia. 
From the canyon of Bitlis a road leads into the 
Tigris valley and from there down the river as 
far as Mosul. A second road communicates 
from Charput, through the pass of Arghana- 
Maden in the Taurus, with Djarbekir, which, in 



86 Germany's Isolation 

its turn, controls both the southeastern route over 
Mardin and Nesibin to Mosul, and the south- 
western route over Severek and Urfa to Aleppo 
and the central Euphrates channel. 

If the Russians were to take possession of 
Armenia, they would build without delay a rail- 
road from Kars over Erzerum to Erzingan, and 
a second railroad from Erivan along the west 
shore of Lake Van to Bitlis, possibly with a 
branch line to Charput and Malatia. From that 
moment, Russia controls the highways to Ana- 
tolia and Mesopotamia, without any danger of 
being attacked in the natural stronghold which is 
formed by the Armenian highlands. No army 
could possibly enter Armenia from the south or 
west, without first breaking through the gateways 
before named. On the other hand, a flanking 
movement into the rear of the Russian position 
is excluded owing to the inaccessible highlands 
of the Taurus and the Black Sea mountain ranges. 
But while the Russian positions in Armenia are 
unassailable, the Russians, in their turn, can de- 
bouch at the first favorable moment. 

To offset Russia's military advantages at her 
western and southern gates by adequate defensive 
positions, is out of the question for Turkey when 
robbed of Armenia, not to speak of an offensive 
against that country, strengthened, as it will be, 
by forts and railroads. Let us suppose that noth- 
ing were left of the Turkish empire but the Ana- 



The Russian Peril 87 

tolian peninsula, and that Mesopotamia, as far 
as the foot of the Taurus, were English, two 
most undesirable conditions, which it is hoped 
will never be realized, it would then be difficult 
to conceive of a more severe menace to both 
Turkish and English interests than the strategic 
position of Russia. All of anterior Asia, from 
the Persian Gulf to the Mediterranean Sea and 
the Aegean Sea, would be like an enormous glacis 
commanded by Russia's military power. 

The unification of Armenia, Transcaucasia, 
and northern Persia by the hand of Russia are 
a menace to the entire western Asia, formidable 
beyond the power of comprehension. If, there- 
fore, the Turkish empire is to be preserved, Ar- 
menia must necessarily remain a part of it. Any 
attempt by Russia to annex that territory must 
be resisted by Germany, as long as it is possible 
for Germany to support the Ottoman empire. 

In the light of these facts, it is plain why Ger- 
many notified Russia that the peace of Europe 
was endangered if she carried out the invasion 
of Armenia, which she had planned early in 19 13. 
This was, in a certain sense, a repetition of the 
events of 1909, in w^hich year Germany informed 
Russia that certain moves of the Russian policy 
would be resisted with the full strength of Ger- 
many's armed forces. The success in both cases 
was similar. Russia did not yet seem in the 
position to match her military power with that 



88 Germany's Isolation 

of Germany and Austria combined, particular^ 
in view of the weakened state of the Balkan alli- 
ance, a condition which was caused by the war 
against Turkey. 

Russia yielded, though hardly with kindly senti- 
ments toward Germany. On the contrary, from 
the political defeat which Russia had suffered 
she reasoned that far more comprehensive prepa- 
rations were required to break Germany's and 
Austria's opposition to her projects. It seemis 
that a far reaching demand had been made of 
the French ally, nothing less than the re-estab- 
lishment of the three years' military service. By 
increasing her army to a peace establishment of 
eight hundred thousand men or more it was 
hoped that, in case of war with Germany, France 
would be able to display her superiority in the 
early and supposedly decisive battles, even before 
the mobilization of the countries involved had 
been completed. For the assumption that the 
idea of the three years' service did not have its 
inception with the French, but originated with 
Russia, Theodor Schiemann advanced a number 
of noteworthy proofs. Accordingly, Russia 
clothed her wish in the form of a threat to the 
effect that she would abrogate her alliance unless 
France was willing to yield. Corresponding to 
the military reorganization in France, Russia 
strengthened and extended her strategic railroads 
in the west, improved her army equipment, and 



The Russian Peril 89 

increased her preparedness in the event of a 
mobilization against Germany. France lent a 
willing hand to Russia's plans by granting her 
the enormous loan of five hundred million dollars, 
payable within a period of fiwt years. 

Such were the events that led to Germany's 
recent army increase and to the establishment of 
an exceedingly high military tax. Both army 
increase and military taxation could have been 
avoided if Germany had been willing to sacrifice 
her interests in Turkey; that is, Armenia, and 
with Armenia all of eastern Asia Minor as far 
as the Mediterranean. In that event the Turkish- 
Asiatic Orient would have presented the follow- 
ing appearance: Turkey would have shrunk to 
an insignificant territory on both sides of the 
straits {i. e., the Hellespont, Sea of Marmora 
and Bosporus), with its Asiatic borders in the 
neighborhood of Eregly or Sinope, Angora and 
Smyrna; Russia's possessions would have ex- 
tended as a broad mass through Armenia, Kur- 
distan, and all of eastern Anatolia as far as Cilicia 
and the Gulf of Iskanderun, opposite the island 
of Cyprus. 

Against such overwhelming odds the little 
remnant of the Turkish empire in the west would 
have been deprived of all resistance, either mili- 
tary or political. Mesopotamia, Babylonia, 
Arabia, and Syria would have been cut off from 
the balance of Turkish territory and annexed by 



90 Germany's Isolation 

England, possibly with the exception of central 
Syria, which, by way of compromise, would have 
been ceded to France. The Anglo-Arabian Cali- 
phate with Cairo, Jerusalem, and Mecca under 
English rule would thus have been realized. If 
Germany and Italy did set any value on it, they 
would perhaps have secured an insignificant share 
in Asia Minor. Be that as it may, the collapse of 
the Turkish empire and the distribution of its 
territory among the great powers to the ex- 
clusion of Germany, obviously robs Germany's 
oriental policy of a successful future. 

Under the present state of affairs in Europe, 
there seems to be no practical mediation calcu- 
lated to reconcile Russia's desire of expanding 
her domain as far as the Cilician coast at the 
Mediterranean, and the German life-interest to 
preserve lastingly in point of space and time, the 
integrity of the Turkish empire. It should be 
noted in this connection that Alexandretta, which 
is Russia's objective point at the coast, is at the 
same time the maritime starting point of the 
Bagdad railroad and of the Cilician cotton dis- 
trict. If Russia persists in disturbing the peace 
of Europe on every occasion that seems to serve 
her political aspirations, it is difficult to see how 
a friendly solution of the Oriental question can 
be reached. 

Russia's political tendencies, when still in the 
stage of the Balkan alliance, necessarily aroused 



The Russian Peril 91 

England's suspicion and, as time went on, her 
growing active resistance. A quick sense for 
discriminating and weighing the significance of 
future events has always been a characteristic 
mark of the English foreign policy. For this 
assertion there is no better proof than the occu- 
pation of Cyprus in the year 1878. According 
to the terms of the Berlin congress, England 
guaranteed the integrity of Asiatic Turkey to the 
full extent of its territorial status of that time, 
and demanded, by way of compensation, the ad- 
ministrative control of Cyprus — not its political 
ownership, which she acquired later. The geo- 
graphical location of Cyprus makes that island 
an efficient safeguard for the Cilician coast 
against a Russian invasion through Armenia, a 
contingency most unwelcome to England's 
Egyptian and Mediterranean interests. 

Even though the Russian fleet is not likely to 
attain a state of perfection that would make it 
a serious match for the British Mediterranean 
fleet, it is nevertheless possible that Russia's 
dominion over the wide expanse between Mt. 
Ararat and the eastern coast of the Mediter- 
ranean will lead to the establishment of a number 
of strategic routes on land and water which 
would endanger the security of England's pos- 
sessions in Northeast Africa and the Orient. 
The immediate result of Russia's Mediterranean 
policy was an unexpected German-English com- 



92 Germany's Isolation 

munity of interests supported by the facts previ- 
ously cited, which had been conducive, in their 
turn, to a more amiable relation between Eng- 
land and Germany. 

If Russia had succeeded, after the Balkan 
alliance had been formed under her guidance and 
authority, and the Turks defeated, in producing 
among the Balkan states a balance of power 
such as would make Russia's permanent political 
support desirable, she would have indirectly se- 
cured a foothold at the Aegean Sea and thereby 
also at the Mediterranean. According to the 
original plans, the Turkish-Bulgarian boundary 
would have been laid in the immediate neighbor- 
hood of Constantinople and the Dardanelles and 
Bulgaria herself would have secured an extended 
strip of land along the coast and thus been made 
a Mediterranean power. 

If these plans had been carried out it would 
have been more than likely that, in a critical 
moment, the blockade of the Bosporus and the 
Dardanelles would have been raised, to the in- 
calculable advantage of Russia. Nothing could 
have been more undesirable for England; not 
that the situation portended immediate danger, 
but for the possibilities and complications which 
might arise from the new territorial constellation. 
It was but natural, therefore, that, as Russia's 
pressure to remove the great obstacle which 
separated her from the Turkish straits grew in- 



The Russian Peril 98 

creasingly conspicuous, England's attitude toward 
Russia's friendship became more and more re- 
served, and her standpoint toward the conser- 
vation of the Turkish empire more similar to 
that of Germany. 

When the general European situation of today 
is compared with that of 1908- 1909, it at once 
becomes evident that thoroughgoing changes 
have taken place. The main problem for Europe 
and, above all, for Germany is no longer England- 
Germany, but Russia-Germany. England dis- 
continued her policy of isolation; whether she 
did so permanently, or for the present only, is 
an open question. The reasons for England's 
revulsion of feeling have been discussed at some 
length. They were the death of Edward vii^, 
the respect for the German navy, a reestablished 
confidence in the sincerity of Germany's foreign 
policy, the increase of financial burdens due to 
the necessity of keeping pace with Germany's 
military and naval activity and to the new in- 
dustrial legislation, and latterly the recognition 
that Germany is financially far more efficient 
than had been heretofore assumed. England's 
uneasiness with regard to the re-awakened Rus- 
sian activity in the Orient may be added as a last 
reason. It is Russia's foreign policy at the pres- 
ent time that furnishes the key for a compre- 
hensive understanding of the general European 
situation. 



94 Germany's Isolation 

In the year 1905 Russia issued from the Japa- 
nese war with a fleet reduced to insignificance, a 
weakened and disrupted army, and a distressing 
state of finance. During the first few years 
after the war, the country was utterly incapable 
of undertaking military actions, a defect which 
was revealed in the course of the Bosnian crisis 
by her futile attempts to intimidate Germany and 
Austria-Hungary. The expenses incurred by 
the unfortunate war amounted to about one bil- 
lion, two hundred and fifty million dollars ex- 
clusive of the stupendous losses of ships and 
war material of every kind. Even before the 
war, Russia's finances had been anything but 
sound, while, at the same time, the excess of 
exports over imports during the last ten years 
showed an unfavorable average, one totally in- 
adequate to meet her foreign obligations. 

According to an authoritative report less than 
half of the gold, an amount of from two billion, 
five hundred million to three billion, seven hun- 
dred and fifty million dollars, which since the 
beginning of the new financial administration 
of Russia under Wyschnegradski and Witte had 
been drawn into the country, was left there at 
the outbreak of the war. The Russian legal 
tender could be maintained only by continuous 
loans. In 1908 a general collapse seemed im- 
minent, so that the government was seriously 
considering the advisability of declaring a mora- 



The Russian Peril 95 

torium. These facts were brought to the notice 
of the general public by the works of political 
writers, more recently through a secret memo- 
randum of the ministry of finance of 191 3 to 
the members of the imperial council, a document 
which enlarges upon the condition of the imperial 
Russian treasury and particularly upon the 
dangerous consequences of the unfavorable bal- 
ance mentioned above. Although this report has 
at no time been published, certain details of its 
contents have become known. It is not difficult 
to see that, under the prevailing conditions, 
Russia's bluff, which in the spring of 1909 she 
attempted to work on Austria-Hungary and 
Germany, was bound to be thwarted. 

In 1909, events took an unexpected turn. 
Russia had gathered in a bumper crop practi- 
cally without a parallel in the history of the 
country. Within the next three years two similar 
crops followed. As a result, the excess of ex- 
ports over imports equaled or surpassed Russia's 
annual foreign debt payable in gold, an amount 
which is estimated at from two hundred to two 
hundred and twenty-five million dollars. The 
excess of exports over imports between 1909 and 
1 9 12 averaged about two hundred and thirty- 
two and a half million dollars annually; that of 
the preceding twenty years, only about one hun- 
dred and twelve and a half million dollars ; while 
the figure of 19 13 dropped to something over 



96 Germany's Isolation 

one hundred million dollars. The excess of 19 14 
will again depend upon the size of the crop, 
though the tentative balance of trading opera- 
tions is not very promising. 

Obviously the decisions of Russia's foreign 
policy are, at least for the present, again under 
the pressure of unfavorable financial conditions, 
which, in the normal course of affairs, cannot be 
remedied. During the four previous years, how- 
ever — that is, from 1909 to 19 12 — the unusually 
favorable crops had stimulated Russia's political 
activity to an extraordinary degree. 

One of the first symptoms of Russia's re- 
awakened political ambition was the resumption 
of her oriental policy. The Russian-English 
agreement of 1907 had already directed Russia's 
political course toward her old aims in Turkey. 
The foreign policy in the Far East had to be 
abandoned; the long cherished plan to change 
Persia entirely into a tributary state of Russia, 
and to construct a railroad to the Persian Gulf 
or the Indian Ocean, was relinquished in favor 
of England. Instead, Russia and England en- 
tered into an agreement, which bade fair to 
bring about a speedy dismemberment of the 
Turkish empire and thereby an indemnity for 
the Russian losses sustained in the Far East. 

The new tendency of Russia's oriental policy 
received its momentum from a number of power- 
ful incentives. First of all, there was need of 



The Russian Peril 97 

recovering military prestige. Secondly, a gen- 
eral revulsion of feeling, both in political circles 
and with the people at large, demanded a return 
from the chimeras in the Far East to the prac- 
tical aggressive policy against Turkey — the so- 
called "legacy of Peter the Great." A third 
incentive v^as furnished by the internal struggles 
between the reactionary and the liberal parties, 
a conflict which was constantly growing more 
violent. Influential circles inside and outside of 
the pales of the government expressed their re- 
gret that the constitution of October, 1905, had 
been granted in response to the intimidating pres- 
sure of the revolutionists. The " true Russians," 
so self-styled, attempted with increasing zeal to 
revise and limit the forced concessions of the 
crown, but the greater the political reaction, the 
more violent grew the opposition, not less in the 
ranks of the moderate conservatives than in those 
of the radicals. 

The most efficient expedient to quell the inter- 
nal dissensions was the kindling of nationalistic 
passions and prejudices, not only against foreign 
countries but also against the so-called aliens 
within the empire. Success was not long want- 
ing. Both the majority of the cultured classes, 
and the great masses, in so far as they are open 
to an understanding of political affairs, have 
united upon the great Panslavic doctrine. 

At the present time, the Russian government 



98 Germany's Isolation 

as well as public opinion exert a stupendous pres- 
sure against the Orient. One subject of dis- 
cussion, above all others, occupies the Russian 
press, the speakers at Panslavic and similar polit- 
ical gatherings, and even the official military 
organs — the subject of the Orient. In Con- 
stantinople, at the Turkish straits, in Asia Minor, 
there, so they say, lie the goals of Russia's polit- 
ical future; to attain them is Russia's historical 
and national mission. Much Russian gold has 
been expended, much Russian blood has been 
spilled for the Slavs in the Balkans, so that Rus- 
sia has indeed a right to their leadership. But 
for still another reason Russia must be their 
chosen head; for, once in possession of the Turk- 
ish straits, it is her duty to protect them. Aus- 
tria's and Germany's oriental policies form an 
obstacle which she must overcome. Austria is 
an enemy eager to subject the Balkan Slavs for 
her own purpose ; Germany is her ally and accom- 
plice. Moreover, Germany is filled on her own 
account with a " longing for the East." But her 
presence in the East is not desired, and yet she 
seeks to rob Russia of her legitimate inheritance. 
Today, it is hatred against Germany that 
Russia nurses, hatred, downright and unequivo- 
cal, a hatred which is no longer limited to iso- 
lated circles but is shared by the entire Russian 
population. This hostile feeling is still deeper 
rooted with those that are conscious of the polit- 



The Russian Peril 99 

ical humiliation which, in 1909 and 191 3, Russia 
suffered at the hands of Germany. Since 1909, 
an almost feverish zeal has been displayed in the 
re-organization of the army, not only for the 
purpose of general defense, but also more espe- 
cially for the final and decisive struggle for the 
Turkish Orient. 

At the same time, Russia was enabled, through 
the unusually large crops, to evoke the belief 
that her finances had again been placed on a firm 
foundation, while her supply of gold from abroad 
was secretly maintained by means of municipal 
loans, investments in industrial enterprises, and 
by a number of similar ventures. Only the im- 
perial government refrained from floating a loan 
in order to create the impression that it was 
henceforth above such measures of overt weak- 
ness. But in 191 3 Russia was dealt a double 
blow — her foreign trade obligations collapsed, 
and her armies, ready to invade Turkish Ar- 
menia, were compelled to withdraw from the 
Armenian frontier. 

The Russian government now recognizes that 
it will not be possible to defer the final issue for 
any great length of time. Accordingly, when 
Russia proposed to her ally France to increase 
her preparedness for war by introducing the 
three years' military service, and to grant to the 
Russian government a credit of six hundred and 
twenty-five million dollars for war-like prepara- 



100 Germany's Isolation 

tion in Russia, Germany met the situation by 
introducing the recent army bill and the military 
taxes. The Russian minister of finance at first 
tried to conceal the real purpose of the loan 
(financial stringency and military preparations), 
and attempted to explain it by an extensive plan 
of pioneering activity, such as the building of 
railroads and the construction of irrigation canals 
in Asiatic Russia. 

But before he had half suceeded, the whole 
truth of the matter was revealed. Extensive 
railway constructions in the direction of the 
German frontier, fortifications, siege artillery, 
preparations of every type to facilitate mobili- 
zation, and a vastly increased peace establishment 
of the army proved to be the actual needs. Ac- 
cording to the most recent appropriation granted 
by the Duma, Russia's military strength on a 
peace basis will, until 1916, amount to one 
million eight hundred thousand men, a number 
which during the winter months will be increased 
to two million two hundred thousand men. It 
seems only natural that in introducing these 
measures, a country like Russia would lose every 
chance for a well-regulated financial administra- 
tion. 

The present population of Russia is estimated 
at about one hundred and seventy million inhab- 
itants; Germany has almost seventy million. 
Russia with a population of two and one-half 



The Russian Peril 101' 

times that of Germany maintains an army which 
on a peace basis is more than two and one-half 
times as large as the German army, and this in 
spite of the enormous difference in the economic 
efficiency of the two nations. In 19 12, Ger- 
many's total foreign trade amounted to more 
than five billion two hundred and fifty million 
dollars; Russia's, to about one billion six hun- 
dred million dollars; or, in other words, to less 
than one-third of the German figure. The per 
capita taxability of the Russian population 
amounts to only a fraction of that of the German 
population. Obviously this enormous military 
burden cannot be carried for any great length 
of time, and can be explained only on the assump- 
tion that Russia is eager to force the decisive 
issue in the near future. 

Russia's national debt, which before the war 
with Japan had amounted to six billion rubles, 
has now increased to about ten billion rubles, 
including the French loan, which is payable in 
several annual instalments. This obligation can- 
not be lastingly met by a balance of trade, no 
matter how favorable. Russia is well aware of 
that fact, and the minister of finance has freely 
admitted it in his memorandum to the imperial 
council. Naturally, all is well as long as there 
is foreign credit; but since the succession of 
good crops seems at an end, foreign bankers have 
again their misgivings about Russia's finances. 



102 Germany's Isolation 

England has always been maintaining an attitude 
of reserve toward Russia's desires to obtain 
loans. The Germans begin to recognize, unfor- 
tunately too late, that all loans to Russia serve 
no other purpose but military preparations 
against Germany. 

There is scarcely any other country in the 
world that is willing to finance Russia's next 
war, except France. The French have, by their 
own confession, granted Russia public and pri- 
vate loans amounting to almost four billion 
dollars. They have thereby tied their fate to 
that of Russia, and, it should be added, they did 
so willingly, as Russia is their one hope for their 
long-cherished spirit of revenge. They believed 
that they could outfinance Germany's military 
preparations, and found that, also in that re- 
spect, Germany was more than their match. They 
adopted the three years' conscription knowing 
full well that the new burden could not be borne 
for a great length of time. 

Russia must choose either to declare war while 
her immense gold reserve is still untouched, and 
the world at large still recognizes her solvency, 
or to decide between disarmament and national 
bankruptcy. France pnust choose either to declare 
war while she is still able to bear the burden of 
the three years' service, or to give up her hope 
for revenge which she so fondly nursed for more 
than forty years. If both Russia and France 



The Russian Peril 103 

are victorious, they are sure that the vanquished 
opponent will pay the expenses. If Russia is 
conquered, she will have another lost war on her 
record — but she is rid of her debts, as her first 
ofBcial act, after peace has been restored, will be 
to declare national bankruptcy. But the fear of 
that contingency cannot affect a government like 
that of Russia. 

It is readily admitted that unexpected develop- 
ments may in the eleventh hour alter the entire 
situation. Russia's internal politics are in a 
dangerous state of fermentation, so much so that 
well-informed persons believe the Russian revo- 
lution has not yet taken place but is near at hand. 
If that is so, it may be argued, with excellent 
reason, that the authorities in Russia would pre- 
fer to stake their chances for a great outward 
success on the fortunes of war before they ex- 
posed themselves to the impending revolution. 
In France, no less than in Russia, there are such 
as counsel moderation, but their influence is next 
to nothing. After all, what is left for France 
to do if the Russians give her the choice either 
to try jointly with them the fortunes of war, 
or to lose part, if not all, of her Russian invest- 
ments ? 

Competent judges in Germany point to 19 15 
as the year in which Russia's military prepared- 
ness will have attained a moderately high degree 
of perfection. It can, of course, not be expected 



104 German/y's Isolation 

that until then all desirable strategic railroads on 
her western boundary will be completed. Never- 
theless, certain important prerequisites for mobil- 
ization and readiness for battle may until 191 5 
be adequately fulfilled. Preparedness for war is 
obviously a relative concept. No nation is ever 
fully prepared, as its opponent is likewise at work, 
and his progress continually demands new meas- 
ures to counteract whatever advantages may have 
been gained on the hostile side. 

This race for supremacy also characterizes 
Germany and Russia. The Russian strategic 
railways which had been planned, supposedly 
by special request of the French general stafif, 
would require several years for their completion. 
Similarly, the Russian army would reach its high- 
est numerical development, as provided by the 
recent recruiting laws, not until 191 6. And yet, 
if the political situation would warrant the fatal 
step, it is not impossible that Russia may resolve 
to force the decision of the sword some time 
during the year 191 5 or even earlier. 

There seems to be no doubt that the recent 
"disclosures" of the defects in the French army, 
even though they may have been intentionally 
emphasized, and, for purposes of internal politics, 
been given prominence, have put a damper on 
public opinion in France and in Russia. While 
this fact is not without value for the preserva- 
tion of peace, it will not prove an obstacle to 



The Russian Peril 105 

France such as was encountered a few years ago, 
when it was discovered that the powder intended 
for the navy was utterly useless. In fact, nothing 
will decide the question of peace and war but the 
demands of either the Russian-French interests 
or those of Russia's leading political faction. 
Neither Russia nor France will, in that case, 
be influenced by the somewhat incomplete state 
of military preparedness. Again, I should like 
to emphasize the fact that, above all, the critical 
condition of Russia's finances is the one great 
source of danger. To restore them to a normal 
basis by peaceful means seems well-nigh impos- 
sible unless Russia decided forthwith to abandon 
her policy of armament and to apply all her 
powers to necessary reforms within her borders. 
The possibility of national bankruptcy is the 
most dangerous encouragement for a war-like 
gamble, as both victory and defeat open an equal 
prospect to shake off the entire burden of the 
stupendous national debt. And yet the impend- 
ing bankruptcy cannot be averted except perhaps 
by another series of bumper crops or by an indefi- 
nitely continued renewal of French loans. The 
irresistible power of Russia's traditions to con- 
quer and expand, the hatred against Germany 
and Austria — a hatred unequaled in its venom- 
ousness, and a powerful national will to domi- 
nate the Orient, have jointly created a situation 
whose gravity can scarcely be overestimated. As 



106 Germany's Isolation 

a matter of fact, the peace of Europe is more 
endangered today than it has been for some time 
in the past. In view of these unfortunate facts, 
nothing seems more natural or necessary for 
Germany than to strain her every fiber in pre- 
paring for the defense of the country. 



CHAPTER VI 

THE SALIENT IDEAS OF GERMANY'S FOREIGN 
POLICY 

^T^HERE is, at the present time, scarcely a 
•*• task more difficult than the pursuit of Ger- 
man politics. World economics have led the 
Germans inevitably into world politics without 
permitting them to decide whether or not they 
would be willing to undertake the new tasks 
which must necessarily arise. Other great na- 
tions with older claims in world politics most 
naturally look upon Germany's rise as an in- 
fringement upon their own interests. It is 
instructive to compare their presumable develop- 
ment with that of Germany. 

Half a century ago, Russia had about as many 
inhabitants as Germany has today, that is, close 
to seventy million. Since then the Russian popu- 
lation about doubled, being now estimated at one 
hundred and seventy million, more or less. Rus- 
sia's rate of increase is very high, considerably 
higher than that of Germany, and it will grow 
still more when the progress in public sanitary 
regulations reduces the rate of mortality. In 
twenty years from now, the population of Russia 

107 



lOS Germany's Isolation 

will presumably have reached the two hundred 
million mark. No doubt, her political, economic, 
and cultural conditions are unstable, and are 
likely, within the near future, to assume a still 
more critical character. While the general effi- 
ciency of the country may thereby receive a 
temporary though severe check, the numerical 
growth of the nation will proceed uninterruptedly. 

In the course of time, the forces inherent in 
Russia's national life are sure to develop, even 
though they may first have to overcome countless 
difficulties. On a given area, Russia's agricul- 
ture yields at the present time only one- fourth 
that of Germany. That rate is certain to grow, 
and, although Russia's farming industry may 
never reach more than half of Germany's pro- 
ductivity, her available farm lands are capable 
of supporting double the present population of 
the country. Additional possibilities are offered 
by the colonization of Siberia and Turkestan. 
It is safe to suppose that in the second half of 
the twentieth century, Russia will have grown to 
an empire of three hundred million inhabitants. 

England's future is of a different kind, though 
not less promising. Perhaps, within the next 
few decades, that country will girdle the earth 
as a gigantic federal empire consisting of Canada, 
Australia, South Africa, and the British Isles, 
with a direct control over the African and 
Asiatic colonies inhabited by non-European races. 



Germany's Foreign Policy 109 

Of the first three named, Canada will, no doubt, 
experience the fastest increase in population. 
Regarding Australia, it was formerly believed 
that, owing to its arid quality, it would always 
be but sparsely populated. However, the great 
strides of modern agricultural methods in rain- 
less tracts open up a far more favorable future 
for the Australian continent than has hitherto 
been thought possible. Besides, the islands of 
New Zealand, which have great climatic advan- 
tages, can alone maintain twenty million people. 
True it is that the Dutch Africans in South 
Africa freed themselves surprisingly fast from 
English influence ; and yet, the more independent 
the former Boers grow in the administration of 
their internal affairs, the more readily will they 
declare themselves willing to be and to remain a 
powerful member of the great English world 
empire. 

The United States of America may experience 
an economic and political future far more won- 
derful than the human mind is able to picture, 
particularly so if the Americans will continue to 
foster a still higher type of national conscious- 
ness and provide for an adequate federal army. 
Perhaps future conditions will train them to these 
needs. But, in either case, they are a world 
power whose weight is bound to influence the 
march of human events. 

To the number of progressive world powers 



110 Germany's Isolation 

must be added the French, who, in the face of 
elemental difficulties, stake their all on maintain- 
ing a place in world politics, and the Italians, 
with their growing demands in international 
affairs. Russia, England, and the United States 
have every possibility, here or across the ocean, 
of territorial expansion; Germany is not so 
fortunately situated. The words of the poet, 
'* Where wert thou when the world was parceled 
out ? " have assumed a most serious meaning for 
Germany. As yet it is Germany's good fortune 
that it is not only quantity but also quality which 
makes for a nation's power; but there is a defi- 
nite limit in world politics beyond which number 
cannot be outweighed by quality. 

Other nations are in the position of building 
their national and politico-economic existence on 
an external foundation of boundless dimensions; 
Germany has nothing but its firmly bounded 
European base, on which she is forced to build 
her national and industrial life, tower-like, 
higher and higher. But trees and towers do 
not grow into the heavens. If, therefore, Ger- 
many is eager to maintain its place among world 
powers, she must necessarily, in one way or the 
other, seek to enlarge the foundations of her 
national existence. 

A certain publication entitled German World 
Policies and No War, a paper which, though 
frequently quoted, cannot be too emphatically 



Germany's Foreign Policy 111 

rejected, denies the aims of a German world 
policy proper. And yet the writer cannot escape 
impressing his readers with the necessity that at 
least an apparent aim of world policies would 
have to be set up. The author of this pamphlet 
has been charged, rightly or wrongly, with hav- 
ing yielded to influences from above. Be that as 
it may, his views have aroused the majority of 
German political economists, men in independent 
positions, to an open opposition to any policy 
tending to reduce Germany's foreign aims. 

Recently, another publication appeared, which, 
from its more forcible and optimistic tone, may 
be characterized as the very opposite of the 
aforenamed pamphlet. There are convincing 
reasons that this second work originated within 
the circle of professional political economists, 
more especially of those that confine their studies 
to Germany's foreign policy. I am referring to 
the book entitled Essentials of Present-day World 
Politics, which appeared under the pseudonym 
" Ruedorffer." Starting out from the Bismarck- 
ean policies at the time of what is known as the 
saturation of Germany, this Mr. Ruedorffer 
enlarges in a most excellent manner on the two 
motor-principles of Germany's political activity, 
viz., concentration and expansion. 

Ruedorffer says: 

Bismarck looked upon the consolidation of Ger- 
many's newly acquired unity as the first and prin- 



112 Germany^s Isolation 

cipal task after the fortunate war with France. To 
divert the attention of France from the Rhine 
border, he favored, as much as he could, French 
expansion in Africa and Asia. When, toward the 
end of his career, he attempted to secure, for a 
future colonial activity of Germany, a few African 
tracts which had not yet been claimed by any other 
power, he was extremely careful not to encroach 
upon England's interests. He avoided pushing Ger- 
many's claims beyond South West Africa and 
annexing the hinterland of the Cape Colony, a ter- 
ritory today known as Rhodesia. 

Bismarck kept Germany's world policies within 
the limits w^hich, according to his opinion, were 
prescribed by her continental policies. He placed 
the continental policy in every detail above the 
world policy, and granted to the first no more than 
the interest of the second permitted. 

But the new German empire grew beyond its 
narrow confines. The population has an annual 
increase of from eight hundred thousand to nine 
hundred thousand inhabitants. For these new 
masses, food or its equivalent, work, must be found. 
To support the steadily increasing population, Ger- 
man products must find additional foreign markets. 
More and more products of German industry must 
find their way across the German borders. The 
stupendous economic rise which followed the con- 
solidation of the country is well known everywhere. 

Thanks to the enduring industry of the German 
people, their efficiency, their scientific training, and 
their unusual creative force, the country succeeded 
in exporting the products of manufacture, rather 
than human material. Germany's economic activity, 
with its results and its interests, encompasses the 
whole world. Some of its branches have conquered 
the highest place, all of them a second or third 
rank. These economic successes were naturally 
followed by political interests. The marvelous 



Germany's Foreign Policy 113 

power of productivity which characterizes this 
aspiring people forces the new empire into the pur- 
suance of world policies. . . . 

The development of economic interests and the 
subsequent need of world policies on the one side, 
and the continental limitations of the German em- 
pire on the other, have created the peculiar political 
status of modern Germany. Germany is closed in 
on all sides by civilized countries with old political 
traditions. Colonial expansion along her borders 
is excluded. The country occupies the very center 
of a group of world powers. No other country is 
similarly located. All of its neighbors have a ter- 
ritory of possible expansion, so to speak, at their 
very gates. Russia has Asia, Austria-Hungary has 
the Balkans, France and Italy have the northern 
coast of France, sea-encircled Albion has the great 
wide world. All these countries have practically 
only one border to defend, while the others are free 
from possible attacks. 

Germany constituting the very core of Europe is 
more dependent on the general political constellation 
of the continent than any one of her neighbors. 
It is difficult for her to protect herself against hostile 
aUiances, and, to do so successfully, she is constantly 
forced to go to considerable expenses for diplomatic 
or military purposes. Bismarck was keenly con- 
scious of this peculiar state of affairs and it was 
for that reason that he subordinated to his policy, 
which was essentially a continental policy, what he 
thought were the lesser needs of a world policy. 

In every enterprise, whether on African, Turkish, 
Persian, or Chinese soil, Germany's policy will nec- 
essarily have to take account of the presumable 
reaction on the European political constellation. If 
Germany encounters Russian interests in Turkey, 
in Persia, or in China, she will thereby bind Russia 
still more closely to immutable France; if she in- 
fringes upon England's interests in Mesopotamia, 



114 Germany's Isolation 

she will see England on the side of her opponents. 
As a matter of fact, Germany's early ventures in 
her world policy had exactly those effects. The 
German policy in the Orient, which was ushered in 
by the Bagdad railroad plan, showed to Russia and 
France a common potential opponent and contrib- 
uted greatly to their mutual understanding. For 
that very reason, German diplomats of the conti- 
nental turn of mind considered this enterprise a 
tactical mistake of the German policy. 



Ruedorffer establishes the fact that the first 
departure from Bismarckean tradition must be 
interpreted as a practical recognition that Ger- 
many's development can no longer afford to yield 
offhand to foreign pressure, when the acquisition 
of promising over-sea territories is at stake. 
That this sudden change of policy, which occurred 
in 1904, on the occasion of the French colonial 
venture in Morocco, involved a number of side 
issues and secondary considerations, concerning 
which there can as yet be no unbiased historical 
judgment, cannot detract from the significance 
of Ruedorffer's contention. 

From the foregoing it must, of course, not be 
inferred that in 1904 Germany had planned to 
appropriate all or part of Morocco. The crisis 
of 1904 does, indeed, teach the one fact that the 
new interests of the empire began to quarrel with 
the older traditions of Germany's continental 
policy. The underlying motive of the new policy 
is, of course, the expressed or unexpressed desire 



Germany's Foreign Policy 115 

for compensation. There is no need of depriv- 
ing a rival nation of a much coveted object; on 
the other hand, it has become a principle for the 
political conduct of any nation to acquiesce in 
the growth of over-sea power of a rival only if 
such nation acquires corresponding interests 
which remove all danger of supremacy. 

Nothing is more instructive than a study 
of the difficulties encountered by Germany in 
the pursuance of her Morocco policy from the 
Algeciras conference in 1906 to the Morocco- 
Congo treaty with France in 191 1. France con- 
sciously aimed at rendering the Congo acts null 
and void, by slowly undermining the independ- 
ence of Morocco. In Ruedorffer's words : 

On the basis of the international conference in 
1906, Germany had certainly every cause to adopt 
rigorous measures against the French action in 
Morocco, but every attempt in that direction was 
halted by a hostile grouping of world powers, under 
whose protection France felt perfectly secure. Each 
additional attempt by Germany helped to knit that 
group into a stronger union. The Morocco question 
not only lent strength to King Edward's so-called 
policy of isolation but, at the same time, furnished a 
means to test its efficacy. 

The pettiness of the individual French offences 
against the Algeciras acts made it impossible for 
Germany to appeal to the decision of the sword. 
In this way Germany's policy was paralyzed by a 
European constellation which drew its very strength 
from the Morocco question and exerted an influence 
on other matters of vital importance for Germany. 
This reciprocal dependence of world policies and 



116 Germany's Isolation 

continental policies constitutes, if you please, a cir- 
culus vitiosus, the vicious circle of Germany s for- 
eign policy. German enterprises abroad react on 
the continental policy, and it is under pressure from 
the continental policy that Germany's world policies 
find their limitations. 

The question naturally arises: Are the Ger- 
mans content with a mere statement of these 
discordant difficulties ? Are they satisfied to veer 
aimlessly between world policies and continental 
policies ? In accordance with the demands of the 
growing interests of Germany's political exist- 
ence, the answer must be emphatically in the 
negative. In this connection we are reminded of 
an old maxim, Navigare mecesse est, vivere nan 
est necesse — navigation is necessary, living is 
not ; or, as Ruedorff er puts it : 

There is no escape from the pursuance of world 
policies. The economic expansion and the enormous 
vital force of the nation demand release from its 
narrow confines. The policy of Germany must 
break 'the vicious circle. That task is the salient 
problem of Germany's foreign policy, and, whatever 
measures may be put forth, must be interpreted as 
an attempt to bring about its solution. It is obvious 
that Germany's latitude of action in her foreign 
enterprises will be the greater the more independent 
of the constellation of powers the empire is growing. 
For this reason it will be one of her first and fore- 
most acts to free herself from the cauchemar des 
coalitions, the nightmare of hostile alliances, that 
seems to have tormented Bismarck. 

It is therefore the first requirement of a German 
world policy to build up the strength of the country 



Germany's Foreign Policy 117 

to such a degree that, no matter how strong the 
hostile coaHtion, the chances for victory would be 
on the German side. Only then will Germany be 
able effectually to offset the reactions of her enter- 
prises abroad on the European constellations. In 
fact, there will be no reactions when it becomes 
known that on the continent she is not assailable, 
with any hope of success, by a hostile alliance of 
world powers. 

The future of Germany's world policy will be 
decided on the continent. German public opinion 
has not yet fully comprehended the interdependence 
of Germany's military place in Europe and her 
freedom of action in her foreign enterprises. Ac- 
cordingly, the navy is generally looked upon as the 
most important instrument of a world policy, and, 
since the political aspiration of the Germans are 
directed upon the world at large, the navy is today 
a more popular institution than the army. 

No doubt, this last statement of Ruedorffer is 
fully justified, but it is not less true that Ger- 
many without an adequate naval program would 
have never succeeded in forcing England into 
her present attitude. That an understanding 
within certain limits with England ought to be 
one of the loftiest aims of Germany's policy, is 
readily admitted; and yet it is of vital impor- 
tance for Germany to possess a navy which is 
strong enough, even at the expense of defeat, 
to endanger England's supremacy on the seas. 
Without that deterrent, England will be tempted 
again and again to substitute for the state of 
mutual consideration a demand for compliance 
to English needs and desiderata. 



118 Germany's Isolation 

In the preceding chapter if has been shown 
that the French spirit of revenge and the failure 
of Russia's oriental policy, which was due to 
Germany's interference in the Turkish affairs, 
resulted in constantly increasing military and 
financial efforts of the dual alliance, as well as 
in the recent army increase and army taxes in 
Germany. Already it may be safely asserted 
that Germany will not be spared the next and, 
for the time being, last step of calling to the 
colors the forty thousand supernumerary and 
untrained men of military age. An unexpected 
outbreak of hostilities will, of course, hasten that 
measure. 

The expenses incurred by this additional con- 
scription will not be small; they will amount to 
about twenty-five million dollars, exclusive of a 
corresponding initial outla}^ Monetary consid- 
erations, however, can play no part when the 
safety of the empire is at stake, particularly in 
view of the fact that Germany can bear up under 
the financial strain for a longer period than 
either England or France, not to speak of the 
Russians, who exist only by the grace of their 
French creditors. The means for the support of 
the forty thousand new recruits will be found 
somewhere, because they have to be found. With 
all these sacrifices, those that have been made 
and those that must still be made, Germany has 
taken the decisive step for the security of her 



Germany's Foreign Policy 119 

place among the nations of Europe, so that her 
strength may now be considered sufficiently great 
to permit an unrestricted freedom of action in 
her enterprises abroad. 

The moribund exertions of the French, who 
have irrefutably arrived at the end of their re- 
sources, and cannot even hope enduringly to 
maintain their present efforts, show plainly that 
the Germans have practically won out and cannot 
be paralyzed or outdistanced in matters military 
or financial. Ruedorffer hits the mark when he 
says: 

If common sense and judicious evaluation deter- 
mine human actions, Germany's success must neces- 
sarily alter the disposition of her opponents with 
regard to her plans and enterprises in world policies. 

The history of the Morocco question proved 
that an unusual display of efforts and diplomatic 
resources as well as a considerable political risk 
were required of the Germans to achieve fairly 
satisfactory results. 

These difficulties originate in a geographical situ- 
ation which arrests the free play of power and 
checks the freedom of action, and it is for this 
reason that Germany, in order to be successful in 
the pursuance of world policies, must necessarily 
command an uncommon plentitude of material re- 
sources. 

This statement contains the very nucleus of 
the problem which Germany's foreign policy 



120 Germany's Isolation 

must face. That problem once recognized, it is 
of vital importance to seek unswervingly its 
practical solution. 

Every comprehensive criticism of Germany's 
measures and successes in international politics 
must take into consideration that each increased 
activity abroad resulted in renewed efforts on the 
continent to form coalitions hostile to the empire. 
If that be admitted, it is certainly wrong to assert 
that splendid opportunities have been lost to place 
Germany on a firm basis in universal politics. 

The fact is that heretofore Germany has not 
been strong enough, on land and on water, sepa- 
rately or jointly, to hazard her national existence 
in the face of all actual and possible hostile 
alliances. Only since recently, definite results of 
the so-called policy of concentration may be 
hoped for. The naval bill begins to show its 
intended effect, if not in its entirety, at least 
approximately; the proposed army taxes have 
been levied; the recent plan for increasing the 
army is now an accomplished fact ; and in author- 
itative quarters it has been decided to provide for 
conscription to the last man within the near 
future. 

It must he clearly understood that Germany 
has scarcely begun to he strong enough for 
successful participation in world politics, and 
that the successes scored up to date are mere 
beginnings, which, for the present, form the 



Germany's Foreign Policy 121 

basis of a more extended activity. Politics is a 
man-made institution and therefore subject to 
human errors. No doubt, Germany is guilty of 
errors; but what are they when compared with 
the two cardinal blunders of the British policy — 
the cession of Helgoland, and the dreadnaught 
program? And yet England's power is unim- 
paired. What makes any given policy a failure ? 
Certainly not the individual mistake, but lack of 
firmness in the pursuance of a definite aim, a 
faulty evaluation of the material means at the 
disposal of the contending nations, and the fail- 
ure to recognize the proper moment for rendering 
a vital decision. 

A decisive moment may, indeed, be close at 
hand at the writing of these lines. Germany, no 
less than other powers, pursued from the very 
start the policy of forestalling hostile alliances 
by a system of coalitions of her own. However, 
alliances, at least according to Bismarck, are 
tenal)le only if, in the critical moment, they are 
in keeping with the respective needs of the con- 
tracting parties. In decisive questions of life 
and death, allied nations, in spite of signed and 
sealed agreements, stand by each other to the 
last only if the trend of their fates depends in 
an equal degree upon the course to be followed. 

Germany and Austria-Hungary have been 
allies of long standing, and yet, when that alli- 
ance was first conceived, its creator, Bismarck, 



122 Germany's Isolation 

as is attested by his Reflections and Reminis- 
cences,'^ was thoroughly convinced that written 
agreements must always be strengthened by what 
he terms the durable lining of common interests. 
Since the inception of the Triple Alliance, to 
which the German-Austrian relation had soon 
given rise, there has been, accordingly, no lack of 
occasional hints to and fro, by which the allies 
reminded one another of the limits of their 
common interests. 

Bismarck himself stated impressively that 
Austria's policy must not be tempted to substi- 
tute for the underlying purpose of the alliance 
her private interests in the Orient. Since then 
the political situation has been assuming an 
entirely different appearance. Today, Germany 
and Austria-Hungary alike are faced by the fate- 
ful question whether, in the interest of their 
political existence, peace can still be preserved. 

The Servian crime, in itself as well as by its 
antecedents within and beyond the boimdaries 
of Austria-Hungary, disclosed the fact that the 
political life of the Austrian monarchy is threat- 
ened in its very foundation. H Austria-Hungary 
does not find a way to put a lasting stop to the 
Panservian movement, the inevitable result will 
be that the disintegration of the monarchy into 
its national constituents can no longer be de- 

* Bismarck, the Man and the Statesman ; Being the Re- 
flections and Reminiscences of Otto, Prince von Bismarck. 



Germany's Foreign Policy 123 

layed. Events such as the Sera je wo murder 
show plainly that matters have reached their 
limit. It is clear beyond doubt that the con- 
spiracy originated in Servia, that it was sup- 
ported by the Austrian Serbs, and that it was 
aimed directly at the destruction of Austria- 
Hungary. If the murderer and his accomplices 
at home and abroad are not punished to the 
extreme limits of the law, with a view of forever 
eradicating the Panservian idea, and deterring 
all similar movements of high-treason within 
the monarchy, it is safe to say that the end of 
Germany^s ally is near at hand. 

For Germany there is but one road to travel. 
If the Hapsburg body politic crumbles, Germany 
is destined alone to withstand the stupendous 
pressure of the Slavic masses under the leader- 
ship of Russia. By supporting and encouraging 
Austria, Germany promotes the safety of her 
own existence. Care must be taken that Servia 
be deprived of the power to do harm. If Russia 
interferes by attempting to prevent Austria's 
punitive measures against Servia, Germany and 
Austria must jointly bear the necessary conse- 
quences, extreme as they may prove to be. 
Austria-Hungary as a world power must be 
preserved. 

It is not impossible that affairs will culminate 
in the gigantic war of two fronts; it is even 
possible that England, in spite of the steady 



124 Germany's Isolation 

progress in what amounted to an understanding, 
will, from the very start, or, if not then, in the 
more advanced stages of the war, join the ranks 
of Germany's opponents. If there is no other 
way, it is up to Germany to fight until victory 
is attained; or, if that is impossible, to the bitter 
end. To give up Austria at this juncture would 
mean ruthlessly to destroy the chances for a 
support in a combat which, happen what may, 
will not be spared the country. If peace cannot 
be preserved, England will begrudge the fruits 
of victory to Germany no less than to allied 
Russia and France. Germany, in her turn, can- 
not afford to let altruistic considerations stand 
in the way of measures for the protection of the 
empire from hostile intrusion. 

For Italy, as a member of the Triple Alliance, 
a worthy prize is at stake — Tunis and Algiers. 
Year after year Italy loses thousands after thou- 
sands of emigrants to North and South America. 
These numbers would suffice to colonize the 
present French North Africa, which, in a decade 
or two, will grow into an Italy across the sea, 
a second Italy, with a population of millions. 
Italy will then become a world power. 

Russia's advance must be checked by calling 
the kingdom of Poland back to life. The Rus- 
sian colossus with its one hundred and seventy 
million inhabitants must be divided, in the inter- 
est of all Europe. If it is not, the Russian policy 



Germany's Foreign Policy 125 

will continue to menace the peace of the conti- 
nent and the security of Germany and Austria- 
Hungary. In the face of these possibilities, 
Russia and France would do well to consider 
before they let the sword decide the fateful issue. 
Germany is fully aware of their power, but she 
needs not fear it, as she is conscious of her own 
strength and knows full well that the impending 
struggle will have to be decided sooner or later. 
Be sides y there will scarcely he a phase more favor- 
able to the German cause than the present align- 
ment of Germany's forces and those of her 
opponents. 



CHAPTER VII 

THE WAR 

THE last words of the preceding chapter 
were written, when, after the assassination of 
Archduke Francis Ferdinand, the first shadows 
of impending war were cast over Europe. Even 
in the light of a better knowledge regarding the 
critical situation prior to the Austrian ultimatum, 
a knowledge more detailed than was accessible to 
the general public, there seemed to be no hope 
that Germany's opponents would already find the 
courage to launch the attack which they had 
planned for about 191 6. The frenzied Russian 
preparations of 191 2-13 and the French three- 
year conscription, which was effected about the 
same time, leave no doubt that such an attack 
had indeed been planned — for details of which, 
see the preceding chapter. 

Two cardinal questions must be answered to 
explain the outbreak of the war in the summer 
of 1914 instead of in the spring of 19 16. First, 
why did Russia and France begin hostilities in 
spite of the unfinished state of strategic railroads 
in the west and the incomplete armament of the 
French army? Secondly, why did England im- 
mediately join the ranks of the two warring 

126 



The War 127 

nations, although she could have enforced peace, 
at least for the present, by diplomatic pressure 
on the cabinets of St. Petersburg and Paris ? 

In the present instance, Germany's and Aus- 
tria's principal concern was that an apparent and 
temporary compliance on the part of Russia 
would force them to wait until Russia and France 
had actually completed their preparations. For 
Germany's opponents the beginning of 1916 
would have been a far more favorable time, 
particularly in view of the fact that by the end 
of winter the greater portion of the German 
grain provisions would have been consumed and 
the fighting trim of the navy, owing to the in- 
complete training of the third-year recruits of 
the October mustering, greatly impaired. For 
the present, there seems but one explanation: 
Obviously the Russian government was not 
strong enough to resist the tempestuous Pan- 
slavic demands in behalf of Servia and the 
danger of an internal revolution. 

If the czar and his cabinet had abandoned the 
cause of Servia, or even appeared to abandon it, 
they would have gambled for head and shoul- 
der with the grand-ducal, Panslavic war-party. 
Presumably, therefore, they told France and 
England: We must and will declare war now. 
That decision forced France inevitably to ally 
herself with Russia. It seems as if Russia de- 
cided upon her fatal step immediately after the 



128 Germany's Isolation 

Serajevo murder. No doubt, Russia knew only 
too well where the traces of the Servian crime 
would lead the Austrian investigators, and she 
was reasonably convinced that Austria, supported 
by her German ally, was this time ready to fight 
for her life. 

Austria was, indeed, forced to appeal to the 
sword; her failure to do so would have meant 
political suicide. If Servia escaped punishment 
and were not compelled to give effectual guaran- 
ties against further Panslavic intrigues in Aus- 
tria, the Hapsburg body politic will scarcely 
survive, for any length of time, the death of 
Emperor Francis Joseph. On the other hand, 
only a strong Russian government, sure of its 
aim, could have afforded the venture, in the face 
of internal opposition, of permitting Servia to be 
overthrown by the Austrians and, at the same 
time, proceeding with her military preparations 
for the final issue with Austria and Germany. 

One fact alone will suffice to prove that it was 
impossible to stem the tide of ruling passions in 
Russia. Emperor William, in the eleventh hour, 
recommended to the Austrian government, as a 
last resort, to occupy only Belgrade and northern 
Servia and to confer with Russia regarding all 
further measures. But the Russian government, 
though fully apprised of Emperor William's 
efforts to preserve peace,* was unable to stop 

* See Appendix, p. 179, 



The War 129 

the general mobilization of the Russian army. 
The best thinker in the Russian cabinet, the old 
secretary of agriculture, Kriwoschejin, was the 
only member who had the courage to oppose the 
war. Of the minister of war it is said that he 
was eager for war but at the same time pessi- 
mistic as to the outcome. In spite of this, the 
war-party, headed by the Grand Duke Nikolai 
Nikolajewitsch, won out. 

This turn of events can be explained only by 
the well-known exuberance of public feeling in 
Russia, which in critical moments had more than 
once been a dangerous factor. Besides, it would 
seem that Germany's readiness for war had been 
underrated, while too much reliance was placed 
on the military preparedness of France. Russia's 
deceitful assertion regarding the mobilization of 
her army, words for the truth of which the czar 
and his counsellors had pledged their princely 
honor, were intended to gain a few days' start 
of the greatly feared speed of Germany's mobili- 
zation. 

To understand England's attitude is indeed a 
difficult task. A satisfactory explanation is per- 
haps best obtained by retracing the various steps 
of her policy, beginning with her declaration of 
war. It is safe to assume that immediately after 
the Serajevo murder, the outbreak of war and 
England's decision to join Germany's opponents 
were practically assured facts. When Russia 



130 Germany^s Isolation 

had determined upon war, England was placed 
before an alternative which in its significance is 
unparalleled in the history of her foreign politics. 
There is no doubt that England pursued her con- 
ciliatory policies with Germany always with the 
definite aim that, whatever steps she would de- 
cide upon if Germany became involved in a war, 
particularly with Russia and France, her own 
welfare would take precedence over any other 
interests. 

Was England's complaisant disposition in the 
Bagdad-railroad question and in the African 
issues only a disguise for a long-cherished plan 
of joining with Russia and France in an attack 
upon Germany? Or was her decision to take 
up arms against Germany the result of Russia's 
desire to declare war and to draw France into 
the struggle? 

Now that the tide of affairs has turned, there 
seems no need of concealing the fact that the 
treaties with England regarding the boundaries 
of Germany's spheres of interest in the Orient 
and in Africa were signed and sealed and that 
nothing but the question of their publication was 
left for discussion. In Africa, England's policy 
had made surprising concessions to Germany. 
In Turkey, Germany's wishes had been readily 
met, with regard to both the Bagdad railroad 
and a number of allied branches, such as the 
establishment of shipping lines on the Tigris and 



The War 131 

the working of the oil fields in Mesopotamia. 
The last two enterprises, which had been entirely 
under England's control, were now being man- 
aged with the help of German capital. 

There was indeed every reason to believe that 
England was resigned to recognize Germany's 
competition on a broader base than had hereto- 
fore been possible, in the Turkish Orient as well 
as in the tropical regions of Africa. The deeper 
psychological reason for her change of policy 
lies hidden in the gradual disappearance of her 
suspicion that Germany was conspiring against 
the safety of the British empire. There is a 
great deal of truth in the old but frequently for- 
gotten maxim, that it is not the actual aims of 
contending governments and nations which de- 
termine their relation to each other, but rather 
the mutual interpretations of such aims. It had 
been England's suspicion for years past that Ger- 
many was planning an attack upon her, but that 
opinion began to allay since the days of the 
Morocco crisis. 

The increasing activity of Russia in the ques- 
tions touching upon the Balkan and the Orient 
created a feeling of uneasiness in England. As 
a result, the English policy, since the first Balkan 
crisis, worked parallel with that of Germany, or 
even collaborated with it, in order to forestall 
Russia's manifold advances in the direction of 
the Mediterranean Sea. Russia's plans in the 



182 Germany's Isolation 

Balkans and Asiatic Turkey having been repeat- 
edly frustrated, it seemed impossible for the 
Russian government, after the Serajewo crime, 
to retain control of its internal affairs. Nor was 
it Germany's firmness alone which created this 
situation; England's displeasure at the Russian 
Mediterranean policy contributed to it in no small 
degree. If now the war of the dual alliance 
against Germany did break out, no matter 
whether, in English opinion, prematurely abet- 
ted, or not at all, it was up to England to decide 
with whom she would best cast her lot. 

England calculated that if she were to remain 
neutral, a complete defeat of France and a victo- 
rious repulsion of the Russian attack would be 
the most likely result. Russia's financial collapse 
would inevitably follow, which, in turn, would 
preclude the chance for renewing the war against 
Germany at once or within the near future. It is 
not difficult, from an English viewpoint, to appre- 
ciate the undesirable or even dangerous contin- 
gencies of a future such as would evolve from 
this turn of events. It is quite a different matter 
to establish friendly relations with the Germans 
and to grant concessions in Africa and in the 
Orient to a Germany that is encompassed by 
her French and Russian opponents, and on the 
other hand, to have dealings with a Germany 
that is unimpeded by considerations for its 
neighbors. 



l%e War im 

IM, there be no mistake : these are arguments 
from the English point of view. France and 
Russia having been defeated, what can prevent 
Germany, under the impulse of a great national 
revival and by means of the French indemnity 
of war, from building a navy which fully equals 
that of England? Who can prevent Italy, which 
as an active ally of Germany would help to 
bring France to her knees, from annexing French 
North Africa and making the Mediterranean an 
Italian sea? Italy, with Tunis and Sicily in her 
possession, can gain complete control of the 
Mediterranean route between Gibraltar and the 
Suez canal, so that no ship would be able to pass 
without her express consent. 

England cannot deceive the world regarding 
the real issue at stake. For her it was not the 
question of remaining neutral or not,* but the 
possibility or even probability of experiencing the 
rise of a new Germany destined to gain the 
ascendency over Great Britain. 

If England, from the very beginning, had con- 
sented to a re-adjustment of German-English 
relations after the war, Germany would no doubt 
have been willing to furnish a sufficient guaranty 
for guarding the English interests in a number 
of important points. Yet for a country such as 
England, conscious of its power, it would have 
been difficult to condescend to an agreement of 

* See Appendix, p. 174. 



134 Germany's Isolation 

that nature. It is therefore not to be wondered 
at if the English policy did not even entertain 
the possibility of such a solution. Instead, Eng- 
land offered neutrality, if Germany consented to 
a vital restriction of her military operations. It 
consisted in the double-edged demand that Ger- 
many should respect the neutrality of Belgium 
and that no hostile attacks against the coast of 
France, either in the North Sea and the English 
Channel or from the Atlantic Ocean, must be 
undertaken, so that France would be able to send 
her entire fleet against Italy and Austria. One 
of these two conditions might have been open 
for discussion, while the other was entirely out 
of question. 

Belgium was undeniably a neutral state, no 
less than Denmark in 1807. ^^^ 7^^ England 
took away the Danish fleet in the midst of peace. 
England's action is typical for the question 
whether or not the neutrality of little states, 
which for particular reasons are of importance 
to powerful warring nations, is to be respected. 
In 1805, at the outbreak of the so-called third 
war of coalition against France, Denmark had 
declared her neutrality. On the sea, England 
was fighting against Napoleon, and on the con- 
tinent, Austria and Russia. 

For the English it was of the greatest impor- 
tance that Napoleon should not gain possession 
of a navy which could cover the transport of an 



The War 185 

army of invasion to England. For that some- 
what distant day, Denmark's navy was of a size 
not to be ignored. In view of the possibility 
that Napoleon might compel Denmark, as he had 
done in the case of Spain, to place her fleet at 
his disposal, England sent an ultimatum to Den- 
mark in which she threatened to use force if the 
Danish government did not turn over the entire 
Danish navy to England and enter into an alli- 
ance with her. Denmark refused to comply, 
whereupon the English bombarded Copenhagen 
for four days (from September 2 to Septem- 
ber 5) and took the entire fleet with them to 
England. 

It is characteristic of England's way of doing 
things that simultaneously with the attack on 
Copenhagen she issued a manifesto to the Danish 
people to the effect that England's action was not 
due to any hostility against Denmark, but was 
deemed necessary in the interest of peace and 
humanity; that is to say, in order to rob Napo- 
lean, the disturber of peace, of the chance to 
attack England, the cradle of freedom. 

It is instructive to compare England's viola- 
tion of Denmark's neutrality with Germany's 
violation of Belgium's neutrality. England 
acted in the interest of her safety against a 
possible French attack; Germany acted not only 
in the interest of her safety but in the interest of 
her very existence. The German people are en- 



Id6 Germany's Isolation 

gaged in a war of two fronts, against Russia 
and against France. This struggle can be won 
only if it is possible first to defeat one opponent, 
and thereupon the other. To split the army and 
to send the two halves respectively against Russia 
and France, would render either half too weak 
for victory. Nor could Austria's assistance help 
matters greatly, as the Russian front is of such 
length and the Russian army so enormous that 
Germany and Austria-Hungary are simulta- 
neously exposed to a Russian attack. The war 
against Russia requires a smaller force and must 
be waged on the defensive, while in the west a 
more vigorous campaign is paramount. 

Russia's mobilization is slow and the muster- 
ing of her troops requires a great deal of time; 
France, on the other hand, has the same facili- 
ties to mobilize her forces as Germany. The 
German-French frontier is only a few hundred 
kilometers long, of which a goodly part is occu- 
pied by the Vosges mountain, a region which 
makes military operations on a larger scale ex- 
tremely difficult. The mustering grounds oppo- 
site the open section have for the past ten or 
fifteen years been so strongly fortified by the 
French that it would be an extremely difficult 
task in this region to overthrow the hostile forces 
within a short space of time. 

If the Germans are to defeat the French before 
the vast Russian hordes throw themselves upon 



Tli^ War 187 

the eastern front of the empire, it is essential to 
extend the western lines of attack. Only in that 
way it is possible to outstrip the French and 
force their retreat. But to extend the line of 
attack it is necessary to send the troops through 
Belgian territory. For this reason the German 
government requested the Belgians to grant the 
German armies a peaceful passage through their 
country. 

The French power of resistance would have 
been greatly strengthened if Germany had bowed 
to England's demand of respecting the Belgian 
neutrality. The formidable position of the 
French in Lorraine would have resulted in a 
great loss of time to the Germans and in enor- 
mous sacrifices. In a modern war it is almost 
impossible to take well-occupied and strongly- 
fortified positions by a frontal attack. Obviously, 
Russia would have gained time to complete her 
mustering, and a Russian army of millions would 
have invaded Germany from the east while the 
principal German forces were still in action 
against the French in the west. A war under 
such circumstances could be only fatal for Ger- 
many; at best, peace might have been concluded 
as the result of general exhaustion. 

A termination of the world war in the manner 
indicated would, of course, be entirely to the 
liking of England. If the German forces were, 
after all, successful in defeating the French, in 



138 Germany's Isolation 

due time and with untold sacrifices, England 
would nevertheless have recourse to the medium 
of intervention; that is, the medium of an alli- 
ance with France and Russia against a weakened 
Germany. Nor is there the slightest doubt that 
England would have made use of that expedient 
if her interests seemed to demand it. 

In how far Germany would affect England's 
interests has been stated in a widely- famed 
article in the Saturday Review, a London period- 
ical. Commercial jealousy — the writer of this 
article maintains — will some day create from 
innumerable little frictions the most stupendous 
casus belli the world has yet experienced. If to- 
miorrow Germany were to perish from the earth, 
there would not be an Englishman living who 
the day after would not be the richer for it. 
Nations have been struggling for years in order 
to gain possession of a single city or of the right 
of succession to a throne; why should they not 
be willing to wage war for capturing a trade 
amounting to an annual total of one and a quarter 
billion dollars ? 

That article appeared in 1897. Since then, 
Germany's trade, which is the real cause of Eng- 
land's animosity, more than doubled in value. 
How much more must the English threats con- 
tained in the Saturday Review apply to present- 
day conditions! There is, accordingly, every 
reason to suppose that Germany's strict regard 



Th^ War 139 

for the Belgian neutrality would not have saved 
her, sooner or later, from facing England's overt 
hostility. On the other hand, the restriction to 
Lorraine of the German offensive would have 
inevitably resulted in a great many military dis- 
advantages and uncounted losses of human lives. 
On the Belgian-French frontier French troops 
were ready, in their turn, to advance against the 
right flank of the German army. French officers 
were in Liege when the first advances of the 
German army attacked that city. 

According to recent reports in French news- 
papers, great quantities of ammunition for the 
use of English artillery, had been stored, as early 
as 19 13, at Maubeuge, a French fortress near 
the Belgian border. That these stores were in- 
tended for English ordnance was ascertained by 
their caliber, which differed from that in use by 
the French artillery. Obviously, provisions had 
been made to land English troops in France and, 
jointly with the French forces, undertake mili- 
tary operations from the Belgian border as a 
basis. Besides, it must be remembered that Eng- 
lish army officers had confidentially confessed to 
a plan, which had been discussed by England and 
France during the Morocco crisis in 191 1, of 
sending, in the event of a war with Germany, an 
English expeditionary force to the continent. 
This contingent, as was admitted, was to force 
an entrance to the Scheldt at Flushing, thereupon 



X40 Crermany's Isolation ^ 

land in Antwerp, and from there, by way of 
Belgium, advance against the German army. 

From the foregoing evidence, it appears that 
England had not entertained the slightest thought 
of respecting the neutrality of Belgium if her 
interest in the military subjection of Germany 
demanded the violation of that neutrality. If it 
had been a matter of certainty, or even of prob- 
ability, that England, in consideration of Ger- 
many's regard for the Belgian neutrality, would 
have declared herself neutral, to no greater ex- 
tent even than in 1870-71, when she supplied 
France with munitions of war and provisions, 
the Belgian question would have presented itself 
in an entirely different light for Germany. But 
no such guaranty had been given. On the con- 
trary, there was every reason to believe that the 
very opposite was the case, and, therefore, noth- 
ing was left for Germany but to demand the 
passage through Belgium.* 

* It does not seem to be generally known that the British 
government frankly appreciates the necessity for Germany's 
violation of the Belgian neutrality. In one of the early 
editions of the English Blue Book the following passage 
appears : 

"Germany's position must he understood. She had ful- 
filled her treaty obligations in the past; her^ action now was 
not wanton. Belgium was of extreme military importance 
in a war with France ; if such a war occurred it ivould be 
one of life and death. Germany feared that if she did not 
occupy Belgium, France might do so. In the face of this 
suspicion there was only one thing to do. . . ." 

In all subsequent editions of the English Blue Book this 
passage has been omitted, a fact brought to light in the 
recent Viereck-Chesterton debate. P. H. P. 



The War 141 

Prior to the occupation, and again after the 
fall of Liege, Germany offered to the Belgium 
government a full guaranty that the boundaries 
and the independence of Belgium were not in 
the least to be affected by the war. But Belgium 
preferred not to accept Germany's well-meant 
proposition, and resorted to the decision of the 
sword. Belgium's forcible resistance most natu- 
rally had to be broken — a necessity which no 
one deplored more than the German government. 
It cannot be too often repeated that only by 
means of the passage through Belgium it is pos- 
sible for Germany to defeat the French in time 
for successfully warding off the onslaught of 
the overwhelming Russian forces in the east. 
The outcome of the war, the fate of Germany, 
and the future of Germanic culture and civili- 
zation have been dependent on the Belgian 
question. 

England's demand that Germany respect 
the neutrality of Belgium at all events, has 
another more distinctive motive which is 
rooted in the time-honored traditions of the 
British foreign policy. Ever since the age of 
Louis XIV it has been an English principle not 
to deliver Belgium into the hands of a strong 
continental power. During the reign of that 
king, France, for a number of decades, persisted 
in her strenuous efforts to gain possession of 
Belgium, for which reason she aroused for an 



142 Germany's Isolation 

equal length of time the obdurate enmity of the 
island kingdom. 

Whoever possesses Belgium is in the position 
at any time to gain a hold on Holland. These 
sea-washed, thickly populated countries, with 
their great wealth and countless industries, occu- 
pied in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries 
a commercial rank among the nations of Europe 
of greater importance than they do even today. 
If France had gained lasting possession of Bel- 
gium and Holland, she would have thereby so 
increased her power, particularly with regard to 
her commerce and the control of the seas, that 
alone in the newly acquired territories, which 
England had hitherto claimed for her own com- 
mercial activity, she would presumably have be- 
come a successful rival of the English. Such an 
inroad upon England's supremacy was not to be 
tolerated. 

A similar feeling with regard to Belgium pre- 
vails in the case of Germany. England fears 
that the Germans, once in Belgium, will not leave 
that country, in which case the English will find 
themselves suddenly confronted by the unwel- 
come fact that a stretch of German coast land 
all but borders upon their own territory. There 
is no need of describing the effect of that realiza- 
tion upon the English national consciousness. 

No matter how the problem of England's 
attitude is attacked, the conclusion is invariably 



The War 143 

the same: Either England must attempt so to 
impede Germany's victory over France and Rus- 
sia that it is politically of no practical value, or 
be content with the prospect of Germany's 
growth in world power at the expense of Eng- 
land. Germany is calmly confident, regarding 
the military as well as the political outcome of 
the struggle, that England's plan of action as it 
now stands will eventually prove favorable for 
Germany and unfavorable for England. Ger- 
many will defeat France, and will be more than 
a match for Russia. 

In all probability internal difficulties in the 
countries of her two opponents will support her in 
gaining the victory. And when the war is over, 
Germany and Austria-Hungary, the heart of 
Europe, will be more powerful than ever, suc- 
cessfully resisting the yoke of England's indom- 
itable imperiousness. It would have been an 
incalculably wiser policy if England had from 
the start taken Germany's victory for granted, 
and jointly with her laid plans for a peaceful 
understanding in the future. But such a move was 
not to England's liking. Instead, she preferred 
to fight for what with characteristic English 
pride she terms her "supremacy" on the seas 
and in the far-off quarters of the globe. But, 
even so, Germany will be able not only to main- 
tain but also to strengthen her place as a world 
power. 



144 Germany's Isolation 

It must be conceded, however, that England's 
attitude has in another direction resulted in a 
temporary disadvantage to Germany's political 
and strategic position. Italy, under English 
pressure, suspended her terms of alliance with 
Germany and Austria and declared herself neu- 
tral. In defense of their action, the Italians 
offer a formal explanation to the effect that only 
in the event of an offensive war on the part of 
France they would have been obliged to render 
assistance against Germany's enemy; in the 
present case, however, Germany declared war on 
France, not vice versa. 

It may, of course, be argued, by way of re- 
joinder, that the question in point is not, " Who 
declared the war?" but "Who is the assailant?" 
That Germany was not the assailant is an incon- 
testable fact, in view of Emperor William's 
efforts to preserve peace — efforts which were 
strained to the degree of endangering the safety 
of the empire. Nor is Italy's action due to het' 
interpretation of the Triple Alliance; the real 
cause must be sought in her fear to arouse the 
enmity of England. 

A glance at the map of Italy and the balance 
of her foreign trade will suffice to explain her 
compliant attitude to England's demand. The 
Italian coast is exposed to the attack of every 
hostile navy which is superior to that of Italy. 
The most important Italian railroad lines, the 



The War 145 

arteries of her traffic on land, run along the coast 
Her whole industrial life can be vitally affected 
by a superior naval force of her enemy. Italy's 
export amounts to about five hundred million 
dollars; her import, according to official statis- 
tics, to seven hundred million dollars, more or 
less. Her greatest trading activity is with over- 
sea countries. Among the articles of import are 
grain and seed valued at ninety million dollars; 
cotton and cotton textiles at eighty million dol- 
lars; coal at almost sixty million dollars; meat 
and vegetable food products, except grain, at 
forty million dollars; raw material, except coal, 
at one hundred million dollars. 

From these figures it seems plain that Italy 
faces economic ruin if her supply is cut off. But, 
above all, Italy has no coal mines, all her coal 
for industrial purposes, for railroads, and navi- 
gation being supplied by England. In the light 
of these facts her motives for acquiescing in 
England's threatening demands may be clearly 
understood. Of course, a daring and far-reach- 
ing policy might have safely offset all scruples 
and risks by the great thought of an Italian North 
Africa. Italy's net loss by emigration within the 
last five years averaged almost a half million 
souls annually— a number large enough within 
a decade to settle the present French North 
Africa with Italian colonists. This and nothing 
else constitutes the plan of a future Greater Italy, 



146 Germany's Isolation 

cherished by all far-seeing Italians, an idea far 
loftier and greater than the time-worn Italia 
Irredenta, the unredeemed Italy, which is in- 
habited by Italians under foreign, particularly 
Austrian, rule. 

That question, no less than all others, will be 
automatically settled in the great accounting to 
which all Europe has been subjected. And yet 
Italy ought to consider that only as a friend of 
Germany and Austria-Hungary she is likely to 
attain the goal of her one desire. An English- 
French victory would not let her rise above a 
second- or even third-rate power in the Mediter- 
ranean Sea, while as a member of the Triple 
Alliance she may become a world power. How- 
ever, great fortitude is demanded to attain great 
ends. 

It cannot be too often repeated that the strength 
of the two allied powers, above all, that of Ger- 
many, depends upon the army which derives its 
power from the perfect union of government and 
governed, upon the excellence of the army itself, 
and upon the impossibility of reducing Germany 
and Austria-Hungary to starvation. Germany 
raises sufficient farm products, and her supply of 
live stock is more than ample. All necessary 
minerals such as coal and iron ore are dug from 
her own mines. Gas, electricity, and steam power 
can be generated as required; arms and muni- 
tions of war can be manufactured without foreign 



The War 147 

help and in unlimited quantities. Petroleum and 
similar products are supplied by Galicia and 
Roumania in sufficient quantities for military 
purposes. 

The shutting down of extensive industrial 
activities and the subsequent unemployment of , 
millions of workmen are, of course, a grave 
calamity. It must be repeated that a danger of 
complete paralysis can grow out of these dis- 
tressing conditions only if those, who even dur- 
ing the war draw an income from either property 
or labor, fail to share it with their less fortunate 
countrymen. If, for reasons such as these, Ger- 
many is compelled to conclude a disastrous peace, 
she does, indeed, deserve no better fate. 

But the Germans may face the future with 
calmness and intrepidity; for it is impossible to 
break the armed forces of a power such as united 
Germany and Austria-Hungary. To bring this 
about, the Germans would have to be faced by 
enemies who are their superiors in point of num- 
ber and at least their equals in political uniform- 
ity, national enthusiasm, all-around excellence 
of military institutions, and in the moral strength 
of their reason for war. 

It can scarcely be said that Germany's foes, 
taken all in all, possess these attributes. Not 
one of them is fighting for his existence. Russia 
and France are blindly following the call of 
national animosity, which, no doubt, will recoil 



148 Germany's Isolation 

upon their own national life as soon as their 
armies suffer repeated defeats. England is wag- 
ing a preventive war by seizing her last chance of 
hindering Germany's development to a world 
power which, in the natural course of events, is 
destined to end England's supremacy on the seas. 
Let it be supposed, for the sake of argument, that 
Germany were defeated. England's policy in 
that case would try its utmost to prevent Russia 
and France from gaining such strength as to en- 
danger English interests. A Germany, supreme 
among the nations on the continent, is England's 
ardent desire; Germany as a world power, an 
unwelcome rival. 

It is not at all unlikely that in the course of 
the war England will sooner or later seek an 
opportune moment for concluding a separate 
peace with Germany. Such proposals will not find 
a willing ear in Germany. It is a well-known 
fact that the war against Germany is not the uni- 
form expression of the popular will in England, 
either of the common people or of the cultured 
classes. 

In the case of France it is no less true that the 
great masses of the nation were opposed to the 
war. The rag tag and bobtail, the swash- 
bucklers, fire-eaters, and the blustering editors of 
jingo papers were howling for war because, for 
over forty years, they had hypnotized themselves 
into a war of revenge. On the other hand, the 



The War 149 

French bourgeois, the vintager, the wholesale 
merchant and manufacturer, the exporter, and 
the laborer were at heart opposed to the war. If 
now reverses and defeats follow in the wake of 
the conflict, there is plainly a vast difference 
between the attitude of a whole nation which 
lends its strength and moral support to a life 
and death struggle, forced upon it by a brutal 
and unscrupulous attack of an opponent, and the 
spirit of masses which, taken by surprise as they 
were, give vent to their outraged feelings by the 
cry, "To the lamp-post with the scoundrels that 
brought misery upon our heads ! " 

Yet, after all, we Germans must not pride 
ourselves too much on our good qualities and 
look down upon other nations as our inferiors. 
To cite but one illustration, the moral corruption 
and national disgrace which express themselves 
in an aversion to child-bearing and a decrease in 
the birth rate, have made an alarming progress 
in Germany though they are still far from reach- 
ing the degree of moral corrosion which charac- 
terises even the humbler elements of the French 
nation. The family which dreads the child can- 
not engender death-defying courage for its 
country. 

Least of all Germany has cause to fear Russia. 
Only those that are unfamiliar with Russia have 
reason to fear her. Neither the vastness of the 
empire nor the overwhelming numbers of her 



150 Germany's Isolation 

military forces can impress those that possess a 
more comprehensive knowledge of Russia's inter- 
nal affairs. The words of the old chronicler, 
Nestor of Kiev, who tells of the calling of the 
Norman princes by the Slavic tribes around 
Nizhni-Novgorod, "Our country is large and 
rich, but disorder ruleth therein; come ye then 
and rule over us!" apply to Russia today no 
less than when they were first uttered, almost 
a thousand years ago. A task of such great 
significance as a modern war which strains every 
fiber in the organism of the state more than any 
other war which Russia has ever waged, can be 
undertaken only if perfect order prevails in the 
country; not order in the sense of police regula- 
tions, but the higher order of political and na- 
tional morality. 

Russia lacks these essential qualities. From 
the calling out of the reserves and the levy of 
the militia from their villages at the Volga River, 
from the Ural district, the industrial center of 
Moscow, the south Russian steppe, and the for- 
ests of the North to the muster of regiments and 
army corps for the first decisive battle in the 
west of the empire innumerable obstacles, physic- 
ally, technically, and morally, have to be over- 
come. Stupidity and resistance of the new men, 
unscrupulousness, brutality, and corruption on 
the part of officials, lack of executive ability, in- 
efficient railroad service, and revolutionary 



The War 151 

tendencies in Poland, these and similar defects so 
impair the efficiency of the army that but little 
remains of its greatly feared strength in the field. 

The German quidnunc militarists and pot-house 
politicians are still citing Napoleon's downfall in 
Russia as a mene, tekel and a proof for her im- 
munity from attack. Napoleon's army perished 
partly on the march to Moscow partly on the way 
back since, owing to inadequate transportation 
facilities, it was impossible to obtain sufficient 
supply either from the territory of operation or 
from the European basis. That contingency is 
made impossible by the modern net of railroads 
and other means of communications. Sceptics 
are fond of pointing out another danger, the 
intrepidity of the Russian soldier in battle. True 
enough, Frederick the Great was in the habit of 
saying that to shoot the Russian lubbers was not 
enough; they would have to be pushed over in 
the bargain. 

But it must be remembered that Frederick 
the Great lived at a time when armies were 
led against each other in straight lines and 
closed ranks, the officers before the front as 
if on parade. The individual man, the bat- 
talion, or the whole regiment had but to obey 
orders, to load, to fire, to wheel or to hold 
their ground. A modern battle, however, makes 
much higher demands on the private no less 
than on the general. An independent judgment, 



152 Germany's Isolation 

initiative, and a judicious application are essen- 
tial requirements without which today no great 
battle can be won. Fortunately these are not 
found in the Russian soldier to such a degree that 
they will command the respect of the foe. Rus- 
sia's ancient authorities, serfdom, and the belief 
in the czar as the temporal and spiritual ruler of 
the empire, have been shattered in their founda- 
tion and can no longer be regarded as the basis 
of obedience and self-sacrifice. 

It is possible that the Russian army, in view of 
its overwhelming numerical superiority, will be 
able temporarily to occupy a piece of German 
soil, as long as the German forces are still en- 
gaged in France. And yet it is safe to prophecy 
that the world will stand aghast at the degree of 
Russia's inefficiency which will become evident 
when the combined German and Austrian armies 
seriously clash with the Russian hordes. After 
the first great defeats, Russia, in addition to her 
military inferiority, must face another grave 
crisis — the Revolution. 

For such reasons as the foregoing the Ger- 
mans may be convinced that the present war will 
result in enduring advantages for their country. 
Occasional reverses brought about by strategic 
errors on the German side or by numerical supe- 
riority of the enemy may, of course, be expected. 
Yet, there is no reason to suppose that the war 
will take a decisive turn to Germany's disadvan- 



The War 158 

tage. Only cataclysms, acts of God not subject 
to human control, or the selfishness of the more 
fortunate classes who are unwilling to share their 
plenty with their unemployed and suffering fel- 
low citizens until the enemy is defeated, can 
force Germany into submission. 

At the very beginning, in the preface, it has 
been pointed out that the victory in the war which 
is now raging, is not so much a military as a 
moral test of strength. It seems as if the military 
test, at least in its most serious phases, has been 
successfully passed. Regarding the moral aspect 
of the struggle it may be confidently hoped, in 
the light of events that have come to pass since 
the outbreak of the war, that the people of the 
German Empire will answer the question of 
national self-sacrifice in the affirmative even be- 
fore it is asked. 

That fateful question satisfactorily answered, 
it may not be amiss to cast a glance into the 
future. To mete out rewards and punishments 
before the victory is assured seems indeed use- 
less, and yet, it is possible, if not necessary, to 
draw a general outline of the conditions on which 
peace will be concluded. In spite of the hatred 
toward Germany, a hatred which the French 
have been nursing for over forty years, there is 
no need of reducing the rank of France as a world 
power. Territorially this would mean that her 
continental boundaries be left undisturbed and 



154 Germany's Isolation 

the greater part of her North- African possessions 
untouched. Financially, however, the indemnity 
imposed upon her can scarcely be too large. 

Russia with her population of one hundred and 
seventy million, must at all hazards be reduced, 
and her ability to attack Central Europe dimin- 
ished. It will not be difficult to carry out such 
a plan as large stretches of western and southern 
Russia are inhabited by non-Russian peoples who 
would hail their release from the control of the 
czar with every show of satisfaction. 

But the real enemy of Germany, and not only 
of Germany but of the culture and civilization of 
all Europe, the enemy who for the sake of his 
own commercial profits delivered Germany into 
the hands of the Muscovite and conspired to rob 
Germany of her rightfully earned place among 
the nations of the world, that enemy is — Eng- 
land. Peace with England is impossible until her 
power to do harm has been broken for ever. It 
would be premature to discuss the ways and 
means which lead to that end. Let it suffice to 
say that those ways and means exist, and that 
Germany is resolved to use them in due time. 
Then, and then only Germany's future will be 
assured. To display leniency toward England is 
now but to commit an act of treason against the 
future of the German Empire. 



APPENDIX 

'T* HE following " exhibits " are no part of the orig- 
•^ inal (German) edition of Dr. Rohrbach's 
book. They have been added, by way of appendix, 
as a substantial support of certain claims set forth 
in Chapter vii. Briefly recapitulated these claims 
are: 

(i) That neither friendship for France nor 
treaty obligations to Belgium but solely eco- 
nomic considerations have determined Eng- 
land to take part in the war. 

(2) That Russia had decided upon war and 
continued mobilization in spite of the acknowl- 
edged efforts of Emperor William to preserve 
peace. 

The significant passages in each document are 
printed in italics. 



STATEMENT BY SIR EDWARD GREY IN 

THE HOUSE OF COMMONS, 

AUGUST 3, 1914. 

Last week I stated that we were working for 
peace not only for this country, but to preserve the 
peace of Europe. Today events move so rapidly 
that it is exceedingly difficult to state with technical 
accuracy the actual state of affairs, but it is clear 
that the peace of Europe cannot be preserved. Rus- 
sia and Germany, at any rate, have declared war 
upon each other. 

155 



156 Appendix 

Before I proceed to state the position of His 
Majesty's Government, I would like to clear the 
ground so that, before I come to state to the House 
what our attitude is with regard to the present crisis, 
the House may know exactly under what obligations 
the Government is, or the House can be said to be, 
in coming to a decision on that matter. First of all 
let me say, very shortly, that we have consistently 
worked with a single mind, with all the earnestness 
in our power, to preserve peace. The House may 
be satisfied on that point. We have always done it. 
During these last years, as far as His Majesty's 
Government are concerned, we would have no diffi- 
culty in proving that we have done so. Throughout 
the Balkan crisis, by general admission, we worked 
for peace. The cooperation of the Great Powers of 
Europe was successful in working for peace in the 
Balkan crises. It is true that some of the Powers 
had great difficulty in adjusting their points of view. 
It took much time and labour and discussion before 
they could settle their differences, but peace was 
secured, because peace was their main object, and 
they were willing to give time and trouble rather 
than accentuate differences rapidly. 

In the present crisis, it has not been possible to 
secure the peace of Europe ; because there has been 
little time, and there has been a disposition — at 
any rate in some quarters on which I will not dwell 
— to force things rapidly to an issue, at any rate to 
the great risk of peace, and as we now know, the 
result of that is that the policy of peace as far as the 
Great Powers generally are concerned, is in danger. 
I do not want to dwell on that, and to comment on it, 
and to say where the blame seems to us to lie, which 
Powers were most in favour of peace, which were 
most disposed to risk or endanger peace, because 
/ would like the House to approach this crisis in 
which we are now from the point of view of British 
interests, British honour, and British obligations; 



Appendioo 157 

free from all passion as to why peace has not been 
preserved. 

We shall publish papers as soon as we can regard- 
ing what took place last week when we were work- 
ing for peace ; and when those papers are published 
I have no doubt that to every human being they 
will make it clear how strenuous and genuine and 
whole-hearted our efforts for peace were, and that 
they will enable people to form their own judgment 
as to what forces were at work which operated 
against peace. 

I come first, now, to the question of British obli- 
gations. I have assured the House — and the Prime 
Minister has assured the House more than once — 
that if any crisis such as this arose we should come 
before the House of Commons and be able to say 
to the House that it was free to decide what the 
British attitude should be, that we would have no 
secret engagement which we should spring upon the 
House, and tell the House that because we had 
entered into that engagement there was an obligation 
of honour upon the country. I will deal with that 
point to clear the ground first. 

There have been in Europe two diplomatic 
groups, the Triple Alliance and what came to be 
called the Triple Entente, for some years past. The 
Triple Entente was not an alliance — it was a diplo- 
matic group. The House will remember that in 
1908 there was a crisis — also a Balkan crisis — 
originating in the annexation of Bosnia and Herze- 
govina. The Russian Minister, M. Isvolsky, came 
to London, or happened to come to London, because 
his visit was planned before the crisis broke out. 
I told him definitely then, this being a Balkan crisis, 
a Balkan affair, I did not consider that public 
opinion in this country would justify us in promis- 
ing to give anything more than diplomatic support. 
More was never asked from us, more was never 
given, and more was never promised. 



158 Appendix 

In this present crisis, up till yesterday, we have 
also given no promise of an)rthing more than diplo- 
matic support — up till yesterday no promise of 
more than diplomatic support. Now I must make 
this question of obligation clear to the House. I 
must go back to the first Moroccan crisis of 1906. 
That was the time of the Algeciras Conference, and 
it came at a time of very great difficulty to His 
Majesty's Government when a general election was 
in progress, and Ministers were scattered over the 
country, and I — spending three days a week in my 
constituency and three days at the Foreign Office — 
was asked the question whether, if that crisis devel- 
oped into war between France and Germany, we 
would give armed support. I said then that I 
could promise nothing to any foreign Power unless 
it was subsequently to receive the whole-hearted 
support of public opinion here if the occasion arose. 
I said, in my opinion, if war was forced upon 
France then on the question of Morocco — a ques- 
tion which had just been the subject of agreement 
between this country and France, an agreement 
exceedingly popular on both sides — that if out of 
that agreement war was forced on France at that 
time, in my view public opinion in this country 
would have rallied to the material support of 
France. 

I gave no promise, but I expressed that opinion 
during the crisis, as far as I remember almost in 
the same words, to the French Ambassador and 
the German Ambassador at the time. I made no 
promise, and I used no threats ; but I expressed that 
opinion. That position was accepted by the French 
Government, but they said to me at the time, and I 
think very reasonably, "If you think it possible 
that the public opinion of Great Britain might, 
should a sudden crisis arise, justify you in giving to 
France the armed support which you cannot prom- 
ise in advance, you will not be able to give that 



Appendix 159 

support, even if you wish it, when the time comes, 
unless some conversations have already taken place 
between naval and military experts." There was 
force in that. I agreed to it, and authorized those 
conversations to take place, but on the distinct 
understanding that nothing which passed between 
military or naval experts should bind either Gov- 
ernment or restrict in any way their freedom to 
make a decision as to whether or not they would 
give that support when the time arose. 

As I told the House, upon that occasion a great 
election was in prospect ; I had to take the respon- 
sibility of doing that without the Cabinet. It 
could not be summoned. An answer had to be 
given. I consulted Sir Henry Campbell-Bannerman, 
the Prime Minister ; I consulted, I remember. Lord 
Haldane, who was then Secretary of State for War ; 
and the present Prime Minister, who was then 
Chancellor of the Exchequer. That was the most I 
could do, and they authorized that, on the distinct 
understanding that it left the hands of the Govern- 
ment free whenever the crisis arose. The fact that 
conversations between military and naval experts 
took place was later on — I think much later on, 
because that crisis passed, and the thing ceased to 
be of importance — but later on it was brought to 
the knowledge of the Cabinet. 

The Agadir crisis came — another Morocco crisis 
— and throughout that I took precisely the same 
line that had been taken in 1906. But subsequently, 
in 19 1 2, after discussion and consideration in the 
Cabinet, it was decided that we ought to have a 
definite understanding in writing, which was to 
be only in the form of an unofficial letter, that these 
conversations which took place were not binding 
upon the freedom of either Government; and on 
the 22nd of November, 1912, I wrote to the French 
Ambassador the letter which I will now read to the 
House, and I received a letter from him in similar 



160 AppendiiT 

terms in reply. The letter which I have to read 
to the House is this, and it will be known to the 
public now as the record that, whatever took place 
between military and naval experts, they were not 
binding engagements upon the Government. 

My Dear Ambassador : 

From time to time in recent years the 
French and British naval and military 
experts have consulted together. It has 
always been understood that such consul- 
tation does not restrict the freedom of 
either Government to decide at any future 
time whether or not to assist the other 
by armed force. We have agreed that 
consultation between experts is not, and 
ought not, to be regarded as an engagement 
that commits either Government to action 
in a contingency that has not yet arisen 
and may never arise. The disposition, for 
instance, of the French and British fleets 
respectively at the present moment is not 
based upon an engagement to cooperate 
in war. 

You have, however, pointed out that, if 
either Government had grave reason to 
expect an unprovoked attack by a third 
Power, it might become essential to know 
whether it could in that event depend upon 
the armed assistance of the other. 

I agree that, if either Government had grave 
reason to expect an unprovoked attack by 
a third Power, or something that threat- 
ened the general peace, it should immedi- 
ately discuss with the other whether both 
Governments should act together to pre- 
vent aggression and to preserve peace, 
and, if so, what measures they would be 
prepared to take in common. 



Appendix 161 

Lord Charles Beresford: What is the date of 
that? 

Sir E. Grey: November 22, 19 12. This is the 
starting point for the Government with regard to 
the present crisis. I think it makes it clear that 
what the Prime Minister and I said to the House 
of Commons was perfectly justified, and that, as 
regards our freedom to decide in a crisis what our 
line should be, whether we should intervene or 
whether we should sustain, the Government re- 
mained perfectly free, and a fortiori, the House 
of Commons remains perfectly free. That I say 
to clear the ground from the point of view of 
obligation. I think it was due to prove our good 
faith to the House of Commons that I should give 
that full information to the House now, and say 
what I think is obvious from the letter I have just 
read, that we do not construe anything which has 
previously taken place in our diplomatic relations 
with other Powers in this matter as restricting the 
freedom of the Government to decide what attitude 
they should take now, or restrict the freedom of 
the House of Commons to decide what their atti- 
tude should be. 

Well, Sir, I will go further, and I will say this : 
The situation in the present crisis is not precisely 
the same as it was in the Morocco question. In 
the Morocco question it was primarily a dispute 
which concerned France — a dispute which con- 
cerned France and France primarily — a dispute, 
as it seemed to us, affecting France out of an 
agreement subsisting between us and France, and 
published to the whole world, in which we engaged 
to give France diplomatic support. No doubt we 
were pledged to give nothing but diplomatic sup- 
port; we were, at any rate, pledged by a definite 
public agreement to stand with France diplomat- 
ically in that question. 

The present crisis has originated differently. It 



162 Appendix 

has not originated with regard to Morocco. It has 
not originated as regards anything with which we 
had a special agreement with France; it has not 
originated with anything which primarily concerned 
France. It has originated in a dispute between 
Austria and Servia. I can say this with the most 
absolute confidence — no Government and no coun- 
try has less desire to be involved in war over a 
dispute with Austria and Servia than the Govern- 
ment and the country of France. They are in- 
volved in it because of their obligation of honor 
under a definite alliance with Russia. Well, it is 
only fair to say to the House that that obligation of 
honor cannot apply in the same way to us. We are 
not parties to the Franco-Russian Alliance. We 
do not even know the terms of that alliance. So 
far, I have, I think, faithfully and completely 
cleared the ground with regard to the question of 
obligation. 

I now come to what we think the situation re- 
quires of us. For many years we have had a long- 
standing friendship with France. I remember well 
the feeling in the House — and my own feeling — 
for I spoke on the subject, I think, when the late 
Government made their agreement with France — 
the warm and cordial feeling resulting from the 
fact that these two nations, who had had perpetual 
differences in the past, had cleared these differences 
away; I remember saying, I think, that it seemed 
to me that some benign influence had been at work 
to produce the cordial atmosphere that had made 
that possible. But how far that friendship entails 
obligation- — it has been a friendship between the 
nations and ratified by the nations — how far that 
entails an obligation, let every man look into his 
own heart, and his own feelings, and construe the 
extent of the obligation for himself. I construe it 
myself as I feel it, but I do not wish to urge upon 
any one else more than their feelings dictate as to 



Appendia: 163 

wh^t they should feel about the obligation. The 
House, individually and collectively, may judge for 
itself. I speak my personal view, and I have given 
the House my own feeling in the matter. 

The French fleet is now in the Mediterranean, 
and the northern and western coasts of France are 
absolutely undefended. The French fleet being 
concentrated in the Mediterranean, the situation is 
very different from what it used to be, because the 
friendship which has grown up between the two 
countries has given them a sense of security that 
there was nothing to be feared from us. 

The French coasts are absolutely undefended. 
The French fleet is in the Mediterranean, and has 
for some years been concentrated there because of 
the feeling of confidence and friendship which has 
existed between the two countries. My own feel- 
ing is that if a foreign fleet, engaged in a war which 
France had not sought, and in which she had not 
been the aggressor, came down the English Chan- 
nel and bombarded and battered the undefended 
coasts of France, we could not stand aside, and see 
this going on practically within sight of our eyes, 
with our arms folded, looking on dispassionately, 
doing nothing. I believe that would be the feeling 
of this country. There are times when one feels 
that if these circumstances actually did arise, it 
would be a feeling which would spread with irre- 
sistible force throughout the land. 

But / also want to look at the matter without 
sentiment, and from the point of view of British 
interests, and it is on that that I am going to base 
and justify what I am presently going to say to 
the House. If we say nothing at this moment, 
what is France to do with her fleet in the Mediter- 
ranean? If she leaves it there, with no statement 
from us as to what we will do, she leaves her 
northern and western coasts absolutely undefended, 
at the mercy of a German fleet coming down the 



164 jippendia? 

Channel to do as it pleases in a war which is a war 
of life and death between them. If we say nothing, 
it may be that the French fleet is withdrawn from 
the Mediterranean. We are in the presence of a 
European conflagration; can anybody set limits to 
the consequences that may arise out of it? Let 
us assume that today we stand aside in an attitude 
of neutrality, saying, "No, we cannot undertake 
and engage to help either party in this conflict." 
Let us suppose the French fleet is withdrazvn from 
the Mediterranean; and let us assume that the con- 
sequences — which are already tremendous in what 
has happened in Europe even to countries that are 
at peace — in fact, equally whether countries are at 
peace or at war — let us assume that out of that 
come consequences unforeseen, which make it 
necessary at a sudden moment that, in defence of 
vital British interests, we should go to war, and 
let us assume — which is quite possible — that Italy, 
who is now neutral — because, as I understand, she 
considers that this war is an aggressive war, and the 
Triple Alliance being a defensive alliance, her obli- 
gation did not arise — let us assume that conse- 
quences which are not yet foreseen and which, 
perfectly legitimately consulting her own interests, 
make Italy depart from her attitude of neutrality 
at a time when we are forced in defence of vital 
British interests ourselves to fight — what then will 
be the position in the Mediterranean? It might he 
that at some critical moment those consequences 
would he forced upon us hecause our trade routes 
in the Mediterranean might he vital to this country. 
Nobody can say that in the course of the next 
few weeks there is any particular trade route the 
keeping open of which may not be vital to this 
country. What will be our position then? We 
have not kept a fleet in the Mediterranean which is 
equal to dealing alone with a combination of other 
fleets in the Mediterranean. It would be the very 



Appendiw 165 

moment when we could not detach more ships to 
the Mediterranean, and we might have exposed this 
country from our negative attitude at the present 
moment to the most appalling risk. / say that from 
the point of view of British interests. We feel 
strongly that France was entitled to know — and 
to know at once — zvhether or not in the event of 
attack upon her unprotected northern and western 
coasts she could depend upon British support. In 
that emergency, and in these compelling circum- 
stances, yesterday afternoon I gave to the French 
Ambassador the following statement: 

I am authorized to give an assurance that if 
the German fleet comes into the Channel 
or through the North Sea to undertake 
hostile operations against the French 
coasts or shipping, the British fleet will 
give all the protection in its power. This 
assurance is, of course, subject to the pol- 
icy of His Majesty's Government receiving 
the support of Parliament, and must not 
be taken as binding His Majesty's Govern- 
ment to take any action until the above 
contingency of action by the German fleet 
takes place. 

I read that to the House, not as a declaration of 
war on our part, not as entailing immediate aggres- 
sive action on our part, but as binding us to take 
aggressive action should that contingency arise. 
Things move very hurriedly from hour to hour. 
Fresh news comes in, and I cannot give this in any 
very formal way ; but I understand that the German 
Government would he prepared, if we would 
pledge ourselves to neutrality, to agree that its 
fleet would not attack the northern coast of France. 
I have only heard that shortly before I came to the 
House, but it is far too narrow an engagement for 



166 Appendix 

us. And, Sir, there is the more serious considera- 
tion — becoming more serious every hour — there is 
the question of the neutrality of Belgium. 

I shall have to put before the House at some 
length what is our position in regard to Belgium. 
The governing factor is the treaty of 1839, ^^^ this 
is a treaty with a history — a history accumulated 
since. In 1870, when there was war between France 
and Germany, the question of the neutrality of 
Belgium arose, and various things were said. 
Amongst other things. Prince Bismarck gave an 
assurance to Belgium that — confirming his verbal 
assurance, he gave in writing a declaration which 
he said was superfluous in reference to the treaty in 
existence — that the German Confederation and its 
allies would respect the neutrality of Belgium, it 
being always understood that that neutrality would 
be respected by the other belligerent Powers. That 
is valuable as a recognition in 1870 on the part of 
Germany of the sacredness of these treaty rights. 

What was our own attitude ? The people who laid 
down the attitude of the British Government were 
Lord Granville in the House of Lords and Mr. 
Gladstone in the House of Commons. Lord Gran- 
ville, on August 8, 1870, used these words. He 
said : 

We might have explained to the country 
and to foreign nations, that we could not 
think this country was bound either mor- 
ally or internationally, or that its interests 
were concerned in the maintenance of the 
neutrality of Belgium ; though this course 
might have had some conveniences, though 
it might have been easy to adhere to it, 
though it might have saved us from some 
immediate danger, it is a course which Her 
Majesty's Government thought it impos- 
sible to adopt in the name of the country 



'Appendix 167 

with any due regard to the country's honor 
or to the country's interests. 

Mr. Gladstone spoke as follows two days later: 
There is, I admit, the obligation of the treaty. 
It is not necessary, nor would time permit 
me, to enter into the complicated question 
of the nature of the obligations of that 
treaty; but I am not able to subscribe to 
the doctrine of those who have held in this 
House what plainly amounts to an asser- 
tion, that the simple fact of the existence 
of a guarantee is binding on every party 
to it, irrespectively altogether of the par- 
ticular position in which it may find itself 
at the time when the occasion for acting on 
the guarantee arises. The great authorities 
upon foreign policy to whom I have been 
accustomed to listen, such as Lord Aber- 
deen and Lord Palmerston, never to my 
knowledge took that rigid and, if I may 
venture to say so, that impracticable view 
of the guarantee. The circumstance that 
there is already an existing guarantee in 
force is, of necessity, an important fact, 
and a weighty element in the case, to which 
we are bound to give full and ample con- 
sideration. There is also this further con- 
sideration, the force of which we must all 
feel most deeply, and that is, the common 
interests against the unmeasured aggran- 
dizement of any Power whatever. 

The treaty is an old treaty — 1839 — ^^^ that 
was the view taken of it in 1870. It is one of those 
treaties which are founded, not only on considera- 
tion for Belgium, which benefits under the treaty, 
but in the interests of those who guarantee the 
neutrality of Belgium. The honor and interests are. 



16S Appendiiv 

at least, as strong today as in 1870, and we cannot 
take a more narrow view or a less serious view of 
our obligations, and of the importance of those 
obligations, than was taken by Mr. Gladstone's 
Government in 1870. 

I will read to the House what took place last 
week on this subject. When mobilization was 
beginning, I knew that this question must be a most 
important element in our policy — a most important 
subject for the House of Commons. I telegraphed 
at the same time in similar terms to both Paris 
and Berlin to say that it was essential for us to 
know whether the French and German Govern- 
ments respectively were prepared to undertake an 
engagement to respect the neutrality of Belgium. 
These are the replies. I got from the French 
Government this reply: 

The French Government are resolved to 
respect the neutrality of Belgium, and it 
would only be in the event of some other 
Power violating that neutrality that France 
might find herself under the necessity, in 
order to assure the defence of her security, 
to act otherwise. This assurance has been 
given several times. The President of the 
Republic spoke of it to the King of the 
Belgians, and the French Minister at 
Brussels has spontaneously renewed the 
assurance to the Belgian Minister of For- 
eign Affairs today. 

From the German Government the reply was : 
The Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs 
could not possibly give an answer before 
consulting the Emperor and the Imperial 
Chancellor. 

Sir Edward Goschen, to whom I had said it was 
important to have an answer soon, said he hoped 



Appendiiv 166 

the answer would not be too long delayed. The 
German Minister for Foreign Affairs then gave 
Sir Edward Goschen to understand that he rather 
doubted whether they could answer at all, as any 
reply they might give could not fail, in the event 
of war, to have the undesirable effect of disclosing, 
to a certain extent, part of their plan of campaign. 
I telegraphed at the same time to Brussels to the 
Belgian Government, and I got the following reply 
from Sir Francis Villiers: 

Belgium expects and desires that other 
Powers will observe and uphold her neu- 
trality, which she intends to maintain to 
the utmost of her power. In so informing 
me. Minister for Foreign Affairs said that, 
in the event of the violation of the neu- 
trality of their territory, they believed that 
they were in a position to defend them- 
selves against intrusion. The relations 
between Belgium and her neighbors were 
excellent, and there was no reason to sus- 
pect their intentions ; but he thought it well, 
nevertheless, to be prepared against emer- 
gencies. 

It now appears from the news I have received 
today — which has come quite recently, and I am 
not yet quite sure how far it has reached me in an 
accurate form — that an ultimatum has been given 
to Belgium by Germany, the object of which was 
to offer Belgium friendly relations with Germany 
on condition that she would facilitate the passage 
of German troops through Belgium. Well, Sir, 
until one has these things absolutely definitely, up 
to the last moment, I do not wish to say all that 
one would say if one were in a position to give the 
House full, complete, and absolute information 
upon the point. We were sounded in the course of 



170 Appendix 

last week as to whether, if a guarantee were given 
that, after the war, Belgian integrity would he pre- 
served, that would content us. We replied that we 
could not bargain away whatever interests or obliga- 
tions we had in Belgian neutrality. 

Shortly before I reached the House I was in- 
formed that the following telegram had been 
received from the King of the Belgians by our 
King — King George: 

Remembering the numerous proofs of your 
Majesty's friendship and that of your 
predecessors, and the friendly attitude of 
England in 1870, and the proof of friend- 
ship she has just given us again, I make a 
supreme appeal to the diplomatic interven- 
tion of your Majesty's Government to safe- 
guard the integrity of Belgium. 

Diplomatic intervention took place last week on 
our part. What can diplomatic intervention do 
now? We have great and vital interests in the 
independence — -and integrity is the least part — 
of Belgium. If Belgium is compelled to submit 
to allow her neutrality to be violated, of course the 
situation is clear. Even if by agreement she ad- 
mitted the violation of her neutrality, it is clear she 
could only do so under duress. The smaller States 
in that region of Europe ask but one thing. Their 
one desire is that they should be left alone and inde- 
pendent. The one thing they fear is, I think, not 
so much that their integrity but that their inde- 
pendence should be interfered with. If in this war 
which is before Europe the neutrality of one of 
those countries is violated, if the troops of one 
of the combatants violate its neutrality and no 
action be taken to resent it, at the end of the war, 
whatever the integrity may be, the independence 
will be gone. 



Appendix 171 

I have one further quotation from Mr. Gladstone 
as to what he thought about the independence of 
Belgium. It will be found in Hansard, volume 203, 
page 1787. I have not had time to read the whole 
speech and verify the context, but the thing seems 
to me so clear that no context could make any 
difference to the meaning of it. Mr. Gladstone said : 

We have an interest in the independence of 
Belgium which is wider than that which 
we may have in the literal operation of 
the guarantee. It is found in the answer 
to the question, whether, under the circum- 
stances of the case, this country, endowed 
as it is with influence and power, would 
quietly stand by and witness the perpe- 
tration of the direst crime that ever stained 
the pages of history, and thus become par- 
ticipators in the sin. 

No, Sir, if it be the case that there has been 
anything in the nature of an ultimatum to Belgium, 
asking her to compromise or violate her neutrality, 
whatever may have been offered to her in return, 
her independence is gone if that holds. If her 
independence goes, the independence of Holland 
will follow. / ask the House from the point of view 
of British interests to consider what may he at stake. 
If France is beaten in a struggle of life and death, 
beaten to her knees, loses her position as a great 
Power, becomes subordinate to the will and power 
of one greater than herself — consequences which 
I do not anticipate, because I am sure that France 
has the power to defend herself with all the 
energy and ability and patriotism which she has 
shown so often — still, if that were to happen and 
if Belgium fell under the same dominating influ- 
ence, and then Holland, and then Denmark, then 
would not Mr, Gladstone's words come true, that 



172 Appendix 

just opposite to us there would be a common interest 
against the unmeasured aggrandizement of any 
Power? 

It may be said, I suppose, that we might stand 
aside, husband our strength and that, whatever 
happened in the course of this war, at the end of 
it intervene with effect to put things right, and to 
adjust them to our point of view. If, in a crisis 
Hke this, we run away from those obligations of 
honor and interest as regards the Belgian treaty, 
I doubt whether, whatever material force we might 
have at the end, it would be of very much value in 
face of the respect that we should have lost. And 
do not believe, whether a great Power stands out- 
side this war or not, it is going to be in a position 
at the end of it to exert its superior strength. For 
us, with a powerful fleet, which we believe able to 
protect our commerce, to protect our shores, and 
to protect our interests, if we are engaged in war, 
we shall suffer but little more than we shall suffer 
even if we stand aside. 

We are going to suffer, I am afraid, terribly in 
this war, whether we are in it or whether we stand 
aside. Foreign trade is going to stop, not because 
the trade routes are closed, but because there is no 
trade at the other end. Continental nations engaged 
in war — all their populations, all their energies, 
all their wealth, engaged in a desperate struggle — 
they cannot carry on the trade with us that they are 
carrying on in times of peace, whether we are 
parties to the war or whether we are not. I do 
not believe for a moment that at the end of this 
war, even if we stood aside and remained aside, 
we should be in a position, a material position, to 
use our force decisively to undo what had happened 
in the course of the war, to prevent the whole of 
the West of Europe opposite to us — if that had 
been the result of the war — falling under the domi- 
nation of a single Power, and I am quite sure that 



Appendix 178 

our moral position would be such as to have lost us 
all respect. I can only say that I have put the 
question of Belgium somewhat hypothetically, be- 
cause I am not yet sure of all the facts, but, if the 
facts turn out to be as they have reached us at 
present, it is quite clear that there is an obligation 
on this country to do its utmost to prevent the 
consequences to which these facts will lead if they 
are undisputed. 

I have read to the House the only engagements 
that we have yet taken definitely with regard to the 
use of force. I think it is due to the House to say 
that we have taken no engagement yet with regard 
to sending an expeditionary armed force out of the 
country. Mobilization of the fleet has taken place ; 
mobilization of the army is taking place; but we 
have as yet taken no engagement, because I feel 
that — in the case of a European conflagration such 
as this, unprecedented, with our enormous respon- 
sibilities in India and other parts of the Empire, or 
in countries in British occupation, with all the 
unknown factors — we must take very carefully into 
consideration the use which we make of sending an 
expeditionary force out of the country until we 
know how we stand. One thing I will say. 

The one bright spot in the whole of this terrible 
situation is Ireland. The general feeling through- 
out Ireland — and I would like this to be clearly 
understood abroad — does not make the Irish ques- 
tion a consideration which we feel we have now to 
take into account. I have told the House how far 
we have at present gone in commitments and the 
conditions which influence our policy, and I have 
put to the House and dwelt at length upon how vital 
is the condition of the neutrality of Belgium. 

What other policy is there before the House? 
There is but one way in which the Government could 
make certain at the present moment of keeping out- 
side this war, and that would he that it should imme- 



174 Appendioo 

diately issue a proclamation of unconditional neu- 
trality. We cannot do that. We have made the 
commitment to France that I have read to the 
House which prevents us doing that. We have got 
the consideration of Belgium zvhich prevents us also 
from any unconditional neutrality, and, without 
these conditions absolutely satisfied and satisfac- 
tory, we are bound not to shrink from proceeding 
to the use of all the forces in our power. If we did 
take that line by saying, ''We will have nothing 
whatever to do with this matter " under no condi- 
tions^ — the Belgian treaty obligations, the possible 
position in the Mediterranean, with damage to Brit- 
ish interests, and what may happen to France frorri 
our failure to support France — if we were to say 
that ^ all those things mattered nothing, were as 
nothing, and to say we would stand aside, we 
should, I believe, sacrifice our respect and good 
name and reputation before the world, and should 
not escape the most serious and grave economic 
consequences. 

My object has been to explain the view of the 
Government, and to place before the House the 
issue and the choice. I do not for a moment conceal, 
after what I have said, and after the information, 
incomplete as it is, that I have given to the House 
with regard to Belgium, that we must be prepared, 
and we are prepared, for the consequences of hav- 
ing to use all the strength we have at any moment 
— we know not how soon — to defend ourselves 
and to take our part. We know, if the facts all be 
as I have stated them, though I have announced no 
intending aggressive action on our part, no final 
decision to resort to force at a moment's notice, 
until we know the whole of the case, that the use of 
it may be forced upon us. As far as the forces of 
the Crown are concerned, we are ready. I believe 
the Prime Minister and my right honorable friend 
the First Lord of the Admiralty have no doubt 



Appendix 175 

whatever that the readiness and the efficiency of 
those forces were never at a higher mark than they 
are today, and never was there a time when confi- 
dence was more justified in the power of the navy 
to protect our commerce and to protect our shores. 
The thought is with us always of the suffering and 
misery entailed, from which no country in Europe 
will escape by abstention, and from which no neu- 
trality will save us. The amount of harm that can 
be done by an enemy ship to our trade is infinites- 
imal, compared with the amount of harm that must 
be done by the economic condition that is caused 
on the Continent. 

The most awful responsibility is resting upon the 
Government in deciding what to advise the House 
of Commons to do. We have disclosed our mind 
to the House of Commons. We have disclosed the 
issue, the information which we have, and made 
clear to the House, I trust, that we are prepared 
to face that situation, and that should it develop, 
as probably it may develop, we will face it. We 
worked for peace up to the last moment, and 
beyond the last moment. How hard, how persist- 
ently and how earnestly we strove for peace last 
week the House will see from the papers that will 
be before it. 

But that is over, as far as the peace of Europe 
is concerned. We are now face to face with a 
situation and all the consequences which it may 
yet have to unfold. We believe we shall have the 
support of the House at large in proceeding to 
whatever the consequences may be and whatever 
measures may be forced upon us by the development 
of facts or action taken by others. I believe the 
country, so quickly has the situation been forced 
upon it, has not had time to realize the issue. It 
perhaps is still thinking of the quarrel between 
Austria and Servia, and not the complications of 
this matter which have grown out of the quarrel 



176 Appendix 

between Austria and Servia. Russia and Germany 
we know are at war. We do not yet know offi- 
cially that Austria, the ally whom Germany is to 
support, is yet at war with Russia. We know 
that a good deal has been happening on the French 
frontier. We do not know that the German Am- 
bassador has left Paris. 

The situation has developed so rapidly that tech- 
nically, as regards the condition of the war, it is 
most difficult to describe what has actually hap- 
pened. I wanted to bring out the underlying issues 
which would affect our own conduct, and our own 
policy, and to put them clearly. I have now put 
the vital facts before the House, and if, as seems 
not improbably, we are forced, and rapidly forced, 
to take our stand upon those issues, then / believe, 
when the country realizes what is at stake, what the 
real issues are, the magnitude of the impending 
dangers in the West of Europe, which I have 
endeavored to describe to the House, we shall be 
supported throughout, not only by the House of 
Commons, but by the determination, the resolution, 
the courage, and the endurance of the whole 
country. 



II 

SPEECH BY MR. RAMSEY MACDONALD, 

M. P., IN RESPONSE TO STATEMENT 

OF SIR EDWARD GREY. 

I should, had circumstances permitted, have pre- 
ferred to remain silent this afternoon. But circum- 
stances do not permit of that. I shall model what 
I have to say on the two speeches we have listened 
to, and I shall be brief. The right honorable gen- 
tleman, to a House which in a great majority is 
with him, has delivered a speech the echoes of which 



Appendix ITT 

will go down in history. The speech has been im- 
pressive, but however much we may resist the con- 
clusion to which he has come, we have not been 
able to resist the moving character of his appeal. 
I think he is wrong. I think the Government which 
he represents and for which he speaks is wrong. I 
think the verdict of history will be that they are 
wrong. We shall see. The effect of the right hon- 
orable gentleman's speech in this House is not to be 
its final effect. There may be opportunities, or there 
may not be opportunities, for us to go into details, 
but I want to say to this House, and to say it with- 
out equivocation, if the right honorable gentleman 
had come here today and told us that our country is 
in danger, I do not care what party he appealed to, 
or to what class he appealed, we would be with him 
and behind him. If this is so, we will vote him 
what money he wants. Yes, and we will go farther. 
We will offer him ourselves if the country is in 
danger. But he has not persuaded me that it is. He 
has not persuaded my honorable friends who co- 
operate with me that it is, and I am perfectly cer- 
tain, when his speech gets into cold print tomorrow, 
he will not persuade a large section of the country. 
If the nation's honour were in danger we would be 
with him. There has been no crime committed by 
statesmen of this character without those statesmen 
appealing to their nation's honour. We fought the 
Crimean War because of our honour. We rushed 
to South Africa because of our honour. The right 
honorable gentleman is appealing to us today be- 
cause of our honour. There is a third point. If 
the right honorable gentleman could come to us and 
tell us that a small European nationality like Bel- 
gium is in danger, and could assure us he is going 
to confine the conflict to that question, then we 
would support him. What is the use of talking 
about coming to the aid of Belgium, when, as a mat- 
ter of fact, you are engaging in a whole European 



178 Appendix 

war which is not going to leave the map of Europe 
in the position it is in now? 

The right honorable gentleman said nothing about 
Russia. We want to know about that. We want 
to try to find out what is going to happen, when it is 
all over, to the power of Russia in Europe, and we 
are not going to go blindly into this conflict without 
having some sort of a rough idea as to what is going 
to happen. Finally, so far as France is concerned, we 
say solemnly and definitely that no such friendship 
as the right honorable gentleman describes between 
one nation and another could ever justify one of 
those nations entering into war on behalf of the 
other. If France is really in danger, if, as the result 
of this, we are going to have the power, civilization, 
and genius of France removed from European his- 
tory, then let him say so. But it is an absolutely 
impossible conception which we are talking about to 
endeavour to justify that which the right honorable 
gentleman has foreshadowed. I do not only know 
but I feel that the feeling of the House is against us. 
I have been through this before, and 1906 came as 
part recompense. It will come again. We are going 
to go through it all. We will go through it all. So 
far as we are concerned, whatever may happen, 
whatever may be said about us, whatever attacks 
may be made upon us, we will take the action that 
we will take of saying that this country ought to 
have remained neutral, because in the deepest parts 
of our hearts we believe that that was light and that 
that alone was consistent with the honour of the 
country and the traditions of the party that is now 
in office. 



Appendix 179 



III 

LETTER BY BARON DE L'ESCAILLE, BEL- 
GIAN MINISTER AT ST. PETERSBURG, 
TO M. DAVIGNON, BELGIAN MIN- 
ISTER OF FOREIGN AFFAIRS. 

Belgium Legation. 
St. Petersburg. 
July 30, 1914. 

To His Excellency M. Davignon, 
Secretary of Foreign Affairs. 

Mr. Secretary: 

Yesterday and the day before yesterday have 
passed in the expectation of events that must 
inevitably follow Austria-Hungary's declara- 
tion of war against Servia. The most contra- 
dictory reports have been circulating, without 
its being possible to distinguish between the 
true and the false, concerning the intentions 
of the Imperial Russian Government. Only 
one thing is uncontradicted, which is that Ger- 
many has made earnest efforts here and in 
Vienna to find some way of avoiding a general 
conflict. On the one side, however, it has met 
with the firm decision of the Vienna Cabinet 
not to yield a step, and on the other side with 
the mistrust of the St. Petersburg Cabinet 
against the assurance of Austria-Hungary, that 
it only intends to punish Servia, and not to take 
a part of her territory. 

M. Sasonoff has said that it is impossible for 
Russia to avoid holding herself in readiness and 
not to mobilize, that these preparations, how- 
ever, are not directed against Germany. This 
morning an official communication in the news- 
papers announced that the reserves in a certain 



180 Appendioo 

number of governments have been called to the 
colors. Anyone who knows the custom of the 
official Russian communications to keep some- 
thing in reserve, can safely maintain that a gen- 
eral mobilisation is taking place. 

The German Ambassador has this morning 
declared that he has reached the end of the 
efforts which since Saturday he has been mak- 
ing without interruption for a satisfactory ar- 
rangement, and that he has almost given up 
hope. 

I have been told that the English Ambassador 
also has expressed himself in the same way. 
England has recently proposed arbitration. 
Sasonoff answered : " We have ourselves pro- 
posed it to Austria-Hungary, but it has rejected 
the proposal." To the proposal of a conference, 
Germany answered with the counterproposal 
of an understanding between the Cabinets. 
One might truly ask oneself whether the whole 
world does not wish war and only seeks to 
postpone for awhile the declaration, in order 
to gain time. 

England at first let it be understood that it 
would not allow itself to be drawn into a con- 
flict. Sir George Buchanan said that quite 
openly. Today in St. Petersburg one is firmly 
persuaded that England will stand by the side 
of France, and even that the assurance of this 
has been given. This assistance is of quite ex- 
traordinary weight, and has not a little con- 
tributed to give the zvar party the upper hand. 
The Russian Government has in these last days 
given free rein to all demonstrations friendly 
to Servia and hostile to Austria, and has in no 
wise attempted to suppress them. In the coun- 
cil of ministers, which took place yesterday 
morning, differences of opinion still showed 
themselves ; the declaring of a mobilization was 



Appendix 181 

postponed, but since then a change has ap- 
peared, the war party has attained the upper 
hand, and this morning at four o'clock the 
mobilisation was ordered. 

The army which feels itself strong, is full of 
enthusiasm, and bases great hopes on the ex- 
traordinary progress which it has made since 
the Japanese War. The navy is still so far 
from the completion of its plans of reorganiza- 
tion that it is scarcely to be taken into account. 
For this reason, the assurance of English as- 
sistance is considered of such great importance. 

As I had the honor of telegraphing you today 
(T.io) all hopes of a peaceable solution seem 
to have vanished ; that is the view of the diplo- 
matic corps. 

I have made use of the route via Stockholm 
with the Nordisk Cable for sending my tele- 
gram, as it is safer than the other. 

I am entrusting this report to a private 
courier, who will post it in Germany. 

Please receive, Mr. Secretary, the assurance 
of my greatest respect. 

(Signed) B, de I'Escaille. 



INDEX 



Agadir, Panther sent to, 60, 
61 ; Germany's bold ven- 
ture, 63. 

Albania, and Italy, 51. 

Algeciras, conference, 43, 44, 
59, 60, 115. 

Armenia, sought by Russia, 
15, and Russian plans, 48, 
85-87 ; value to Turkey, 84, 

85. 
Austria-Hungary, proclaims 
sovereignty over Bosnia, 
5i» 52', forced to the 
sword, 128; at the close of 
the war, 143. 

Bagdad railroad, 24, 29, 30, 
35, 130; England's, 35-39, 
78, 130. 

Balkans, Bismarck's phrase 
regarding the, 13 ; Russian 
activity in, 131, 132; Rus- 
sian plans for, 82, 83 ; and 
war with Austria, 83. 

Belgium, 134; compared to 
Denmark in 1807, 134, 135 ; 
invasion of, 136-142; and 
neutrality of Belgium, 139- 
142. 

Bismarck, and the unity of 
Germany, 1 11, 112, 114; his 



Reflections and Reminis- 
cences, 122. 

Boer War, 25, 31-33. 

Bosnia, taken by Austria, 51, 
53. 

Churchill, Winston, and Ger- 
many's navy, 27, yy. 

Congo, and France, 66; and 
Belgium, 68, 69. 

Curzon, Lord, on England 
and the " Middle East," 38. 

Denmark, neutrality violated 

by England in 1807, 134, 

135. 
Dreadnaught, first built by 

England, 45, 46, 57, 59, 7i, 

72; Germany's, 72. 

Edward vii, and Germany's 
expansion, S3, 36, 48; his 
death, 56. 

Egypt, Napoleon's expedi- 
tion, 6-7; England's con- 
trol of, 33. 

England, rise of her world 
power, i-ii; view of Ger- 
many's navy. 27, 29; of 
Germany's foreign policy, 
28; intentions in the Ori- 



183 



184 



Index 



ent, 34-40, 44, 60; and von 
Bethmann - Hollweg, 71 ; 
views of Germany's navy, 
76, 77; revulsion of feel- 
ing toward Germany, 93; 
and world empire, 108, 
109; violates neutrality of 
Denmark, 134, 135; why 
she joined in the present 
war, 132-134; commercial 
jealousy, 138; and neutral- 
ity of Belgium, 139, 140; 
her munitions of war 
stored in Belgium, 139; 
Germany's present view 
of, 154; statement by Sir 
Edward Grey in House of 
Commons, 155-176. 

Essentials of Present - day 
World Politics, quoted, 
111-114, 115-117, 119- 

Europe, her main problem, 

93- 

Ferdinand, Archduke Fran- 
cis, ix, X, 126. 

France, and Morocco, 41-44, 
62-70 ; and agreement with 
Russia, 48, 49; influences 
opinion against Germany, 
64; England's military as- 
sistance, 64, 65; future 
place, no; and the Congo, 
115, 116; spirit of revenge, 
118; spirit in the war, 148, 
149. 

Germany, transformation 
of, 12-26; world policies, 
13, 14; development of a 



national consciousness, 16; 
imports and exports, 16- 
21; economic activity, 17; 
and ship-building,, 19; for- 
eign trade, 19; produc- 
tions, 20, 21 ; national 
wealth, 22 ; population, 23 ; 
naval program, 25, 2y'y 
navy, 57, 61, 76; policy of 
isolation, 27-46 ; attitude 
toward England, 28, 30; 
and the Young Turk revo- 
lution, 50; and Morocco, 
42-44; and Turkey, 54, 
55; and the Congo, 66- 
69 ; industrial insurance 
in, y2, 72)) financial stabil- 
ity, 72>, 74', military science, 
74; airships, 74; German- 
English entente, 79, 80; 
resists Russia's moves 
toward Armenia, 87, 88; 
army increase, 89; interest 
in Turkey, 89, 90; foreign 
trade, loi ; foreign policy, 
107-125; politics, 107; ter- 
ritorial expansion neces- 
sary, no, 113; new Ger- 
man empire, 112; calling 
out reserves, 118; financial 
stability, 118; military 
weakness, 120; and Aus- 
tria - Hungary, 121 - 125 ; 
must check Russia's ad- 
vance, 124; and the viola- 
tion of Belgium neutral- 
ity, 134-142 ; resources dur- 
ing the war, 146-148; 



Index 



185 



strength in the present 
war, 152, 154. 

German World Policies and 
No War, no, in. 

Germany's National Wealth, 
73- 

Grey, Sir Edward, statement 
in the House of Com- 
mons, 155-176. 

Helgoland, ceded by Eng- 
land to Germany, 14, 18, 
121 ; fortification of, 62. 

Holland, and relation to the 
Powers, 142. 

Industrial insurance in Ger- 
many, 72, y2>- 

Italy, and North Africa, 124, 
133 ; neutrality in the war, 
I44ri46; industry and com- 
merce, 145. 

Japan and European alli- 
ance, 34, 36 ; war with Rus- 
sia, 41. 

Kamerun, and Germany, 64, 

66, 67, 68. 
Kiao-Chow, 24, 27. 

L'Escaille, de, Baron, letter 
to Belgian minister, 179- 
181. 

Macdonald, Ramsey, speech 
in response to Sir Edward 
Grey, 176-178. 

Macedonia, demands of the 
allies, 49. 



"Middle East," and Eng- 
land, 38. 

Morocco, and France, 41-44, 
59; and Germany, 60-73, 
114, 119. 

Napoleon, and the French 
Navy, 5 ; his world policy, 
6-9; and England in 1807, 
134. 

North America, events which 
decided its future, 2-4. 

Panther, sent to Agadir, 60, 
61. 

Reflections and Reminis- 
cences, Bismarck's view of 
the Germany-Austria Al- 
liance, 121, 122. 

Ruedorffer, and Germany's 
expansion, in- 117, 119. 

Russia, and Bulgaria, 13; 
and China, 24; and the 
Anglo-Japanese Alliance, 
41 ; anti-German spirit, 53 ; 
and Germany's support of 
Turkey, 54; railway con- 
cessions in Syria, 79; the 
Russian peril, 81-106; in- 
tentions toward Mediter- 
ranian foothold, 81-106; 
finances, 94, 95, 99, loi, 
102, 105; pohtical ambi- 
tion resumed, 96, 97; and 
the Orient, 97, 98; hatred 
toward Germany, 98, 99; 
Military strength, 99, 100 ; 
population, 100, loi; mili- 



186 



Indeoc 



tary burden, loi ; national 
debt, loi ; internal politics, 
103; possible bankruptcy, 
105; population, 107, 108; 
agriculture, 108; Oriental 
policy, 118; Germany's 
view of her advance, 124; 
determined on war, 128, 
120; spirit in the war, 
147-151 ; present condition, 
149, 150, 152. 
Russo - England agreement, 

47, 48. 
Russo-Japanese war, 94. 

Serajevo assassination, ix, x, 
122, 126, 128, 129. 

Servia, and the annexation 
of Bosnia, 51, 52; the 
Serajevo assassination, ix, 
X, 122, 126, 128, 129. 

Seven Years' War, 3, 12. 

Suez Canal, 30, 31. 

Trafalgar, 8. 

Turkey, her integrity, and 
England, 39, 77 ', and Ger- 
many, 54-56. 

United States, future condi- 
tions, 109. 



Vienna, Congress of, 9. 

War, the present European, 
126-154; planned by the 
allies, 126, 129; why Eng- 
land joined in the war, 
126, 127, 129-135; Austria 
forced to the sword, 128; 
Germany urges peace, 128; 
the invasion of Belgium, 
134-142 ; Italy's relation 
to, 144-146; Russia in the, 
147, 152; German view of 
England, 154; author's 
view of the results, ix- 
XVII, 152-154. 

War, Germany's strength in, 
147, 152, 153. 

War of 1870, 140. 

War, the Seven Years', 3, 
12. 

Willcocks, 36-38. 

William, Emperor, efforts 
to preserve peace, 128, 
129/144- 

Young Turk revolution, 48, 
49, 50; and Russia, 56; 
and England, 58. 



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